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FALL OF OKONKWO
IN THINGS FALL APART

Things Fall Apart (1958) is considered as a contemporary classic in African literature. Written by Chinua Achebe, the doyen of modem African writing, this anthropological novel deals with social change resulting from colonisation. It depicts the predicament of Ibo community in the threshold of transition. Published before Nigeria achieved independence, it shows how the advent of colonial rule caused havoc in the traditional life-style of Ibo people and unshered in a steady erosion of their cultural values. The Yeatsian title to the novel hinges upon the state of disintegration that swept. Nigeria in the post colonial times.

“Fall� always presupposes an excellence in standard in the past. In the context of the novel under discussion, the word refers to the rich cultural ground of Ibo village life in the precolonial period. The first part of the novel consisting of thirteen chapters chiefly deals with the “Ceremony of innocence� in the village of Umuofia. The community is found to be held together by a network of relationships. The cohesive nature of their living is amply reflected in the mode of celebrating different tribal rituals. The people celebrate the New Yam Year with a lot of joy and jubilation (Chap.5). The wrestling match of chapter six presents a scene of communal recreation. The rituals of traditional marriage are described in chapter eight and so on.

The society of Umuofians is based on sound moral values. No doubt they inherit some superstitions (chap 9), but their festive nature, indigenous legal system, love of music and painting etc. to a large extent reveal the beauty of their traditional values. By dealing with these aspects Achebe obviously aims at showing that the Africans, contrary to the popular notion, were never uncivilized before   the advent of the Europeans. They had their original beauty and dignity. They had their own identity in fictional terms. Achebe is of the opinion: The primary duty of the African writer is to show his owncommunity that African people did not bear of culture for the first time from Europeans: that their societies were not mindless but frequently had a philosophy of great depth and value and beauty, that they had poetry, and above all, they had dignity. It is this dignity that many African people all but lost during the colonial period and it is this that they must now regain�

In Things Fall Apart the fate of the Ibo community is depicted in the tragic fall of the protagonist, Okonkwo. He represents not only a section of people but also a set of values. The story involves the entire community of Umuofia and Okonkwo is an archetypal figure contending with certain social forces. He is a typical Ibo hero who rises to power and richness through personal endeavour:� If ever a man deserved his success, that man was Okonkwo. At an early age he had achieved fame as the greatest wrestler in all the land. That was not luck......it (clan) judged a man by the work of his hands�. (TFA 25). Okonkwo epitomises the essence of Ibo beliefs and values.

Fate is am important motif in the novel. Just like Hardy’s heroes and heroines, Okonkwo is struck down by Fate that appears in the form of an accident. Inadvertently he kills a clansman and is, as per rules of the community, exiled from the community for seven years: “It was a crime against the earth goddess to kill a clansman, and a man who committed it must flee from the land�. (TFA 113).

Unfortunately these seven years of Okonkwo’s exile coincide with the British penetration and consolidation in Umuofia. As reported by his friend Obeierika, initially there was resistance to the White man’s entry. The Umnofians in fact killed the first white man who appeared in their clan. But slowly and steadily the white men cleverly consolidated their position in the clan. They had built their church, won a few converts and had started spreading their religion with the help of a few evangelists. The effect was such that even Okonkwo’s own son Nwoye had turned into a missionary. The Christians had grown in number and were now a small community of men, women and children.

Okonkwo returns from exile to find that the tribe had become subservient to the white power. Most of the people had accepted the new dispensation without any critical thought “The clan was like a lizard: if it lost its tail in soon grew another�. (TFA 155). Unlike the majority of Umuofians Okonkwo fails to reconcile himself to the changed circumstances where the natives were forced to live in a subdued position. He felt deeply hurt: “He mourned for the clan, which he saw breaking up and falling apart, and he mourned for the warlike men of Umuofia, who had so unaccountably become soft like women (TFA 165).

Okonkwo finds the opportune moment to fight the British when a feud breaks out between the Ibos and the Christian converts. He tries to stir his people to action and protest. He kills the court messenger. This upsurge of violence shocks the people in their changed situation under the impact of Christianisation. Okonkwo realising that the tribe will not him, hangs himself in his compound. His death is at a symbolic plane the death of heroism and independence of Umnofians. In other words disintegration of old values drove Okonkwo to his death.

Thus Things Fall Apart is an archetypal African novel that depicts the tragic fall not only of an individual, but of a whole society that crumbled to pieces under the impact of British colonisation.