Things do, indeed, fall apart

This was another of the classical books that I felt like I was supposed to love, but never quite did. It was as though the people paraded before my eyes and whether they were loving or killing, it was a dance movement that I as a chair could never grasp.

It is the first African book to receive international critical acclaim. Published in 1958 it’s one of those books that seem to be part of a collective culture; the books we hear of but have no need to read, part of a culture that is merely a stepping stone for art today.

In its portrayal of the battle between British Colonialism and the customs of the Igbo there are sparks of something. I wanted to be able to see how the differences between cultures are not right or wrong, but subtely based on the world understand that each society has delivered from generation.

Unfortunately the story was told from the point of view of Okonkwo, a powerful man in the town of Umuofia. Okonkwo struggles with the heritage of his father, because his father enjoyed life and indebted himself in the process. Determined not to become shameful like his father Okonkwo scours all that resembles happiness from his being and works hard to become a powerful and rich man. And he succeeds for a while, but then…things fall apart.

He is appointed guardian of a young boy gifted to the village as a peace settlement. He takes the boy in and he becomes like a son to him. However the Oracle of Umuofia declares that the boy must be killed. So the men of village sets out with Okonkwo as part of the group and a man strikes down the boy with a machete. The boy cries out

“My father, they have killed me!”

and Okonkwo runs to him, draws his machete and kills him finally. He is afraid of being thought of as weak and he is entrapped in this fear of losing his masculinity throughout the book.

Things fall apart for the small village when the white man enters and the two cultures fight each other rather than give space for peaceful coexistance. Okonkwo falls apart because he does not let his fear and his emotions guide him. In an effort to become everything that his father is not; he becomes much worse. He becomes nothing at all.