"Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe.

Essay by luckmeisterA-, July 2003

download word file, 2 pages 5.0

Downloaded 100 times

In the novel 'Things Fall Apart' by Chinua Achebe, a society is presented to us, a society that has its faults and mistakes. Achebe creates a world of people who like us are human and make common mistakes. He explains the complexity of these people and how the colonization had affected their clan. His objective is not farther towards one side as to the other, yet in some occasions it may feel so.

There is a constant balance between reason and passion. Not all Igbo people are considered to be one sided among this scale. There is a mixture of 'good' and 'bad' people, just like in any other race or religion. This concept is also followed through the missionaries and various white people in the novel.

Okonkwo is shown to be more towards the passionate side and refers to that side without first thinking through or reasoning, "...whenever

he was angry and could not get his works our quickly enough, he would use his fists." It is this attitude that brings him to his death. A more balanced individual is likely to be Obierika, who unlike Okonkwo refers much more to the reasoning side. Coincidentally, in the novel, Obierika means; 'the ideal man' in the Igbo language. This is proved by his less violent nature that he imposes, and also shows the varying nature of the clan. The speaker is not portrayed as one sided, and displays to the reader the different nature of each Igbo individual.

Between the white missionaries, there is also a variety of personalities. This helps the reader get a perspective of the impartiality atmosphere the speaker sets. Achebe provides two missionaries with different traits. Mr Brown, who is the better of the pair, has arguably the same balance as Obierika. He is more...