Paper 2

Show how and to what effect Achebe makes use of myth, legend or other stories and tales.

        

         Things Fall Apart is Achebe’s fictional but realistic narrative on the Igbo culture. Written in a post-colonial perspective, Achebe decided to include certain myths, legends, stories and tales. These elements add certain effects to the narrative and explores the Igbo culture in greater detail while exposing the culture’s values and unique ideologies. So, how and to what effect Achebe makes use of myth, legend or other stories and tales? 

First and foremost, Achebe’s way of conveying these stories are in great detail and clarity, as if he was telling the stories to little kids in primary school. This parallels the purpose behind the characters in the text when they were telling the stories. In the text, the stories were being told to children. This was to show them that the Igbo culture knows the answer questions they would ask about life and their environment, to show the children that Igbo is love and Igbo is life. One story in particular that correlates to this claim was the story about The Tortoise flying to the sky; told by Ezinma’s mother to her.  The outcome of the story explains why the tortoise’s shell is not smooth . Stories like these somehow restricts the childrens’ curiosity to explore beyond their realms. However, it can also be argued that these stories are told for educational purposes because they teach about the values of their ancestors about how actions can lead to consequences and these stories can also teach the readers a lesson or two. 

As the audience learns more and more about the Igbo culture and their values, they form an intimacy with not only the book but also the culture, but then these cultural values are suddenly forgotten by their own people and left behind and Achebe makes this clear in the second part of the novel where no more stories, or tales are being told, where everything starts falling apart. So we can also say that the inclusion of these elements add more dramatical effect in the fall of Umofia. 

Oberika Memoir

It is now over, our beliefs, customs and traditions have all been taken away by the white men. More Importantly our children, our future, our youth have been brainwashed under the influence of these people with rather strange beliefs. They made us questions our own beliefs and brought curiosity within our community. Our people were drawn away from our belief system and started to convert to their religion in order to follow them. They were able to expose our faults through manipulation and this tore the Igbo people apart from one another. They even did so in a non-forceful manner nor did they do it through violence, they did it in a peaceful manner and this perhaps signified the attraction of the Igbo people, especially our youth.

Okonkwo would’ve regarded those young, converted individuals as the less masculine members of the Igbo people who are drawn away through affection and new ideology. Only his pride, courage and determination to withstand change would have stood a chance to resist these influences. These traits that my great friend, Okonkwo possessed, separated him from the rest of the population. However, certain factors in his life restrained him from playing out his heroic actions to bring back his unique ideology in our community and implement it. He was the last beacon of hope the Igbo people had to fight these outside penetrations but it was also our fault to not see this in him, which resulted in things falling apart.

Okonkwo

In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, whilst being the protagonist, Okonkwo’s failure to become a hero in the story and let alone his tragic flaw, classifies him as a tragic hero. However, Achebe claims that he does not have much to do with the hero’s downfall. This is because the character is based on an Igbo Proverb “The thought that led a man to truncate his own existence was not conceived in a day." So the overall meaning behind this was that Okonkwo’s downfall was that it was determined by himself; by his views of the Igbo culture and his father’s shadow that slowly overcomes him had influenced his actions throughout the novel but making Okonkwo a tragic hero was a must.

As we all know at this stage, What Achebe was trying to achieve in this novel was portraying the Igbo people, culture and traditions in order to fully express his views of the culture in a creative yet authentic manner. In the story, Okonkwo (as the protagonist) went through lots of trouble in his life such as the death of his “son” Ikemefuna, his exile from Umofia that prolonged his title holding and most significantly the coming of the missionaries. This is the most significant factor for the readers of things falling apart and for Okonkwo, because in relation to other African countries at the time, colonization was a massive problem too and as a result, the audience can then connect with the story and become engaged because as a writer, that is your goal.  However by making Okonkwo ( the protagonist) the tragic hero, the effect on the reader is developed as the reader follows how things fall a part and how it again would hook the reader’s attention.

More importantly, Achebe does this in order to portray the effects of colonization on individuals like Okonkwo. Although it is right to say that Okonkwo was already facing problems himself and the coming of the missionaries only sparked the tip of the wire in order to trigger the fire inside Okonkwo. As a whole, making Okonkwo’s death a tragic hero’s death would draw connections between the effects of colonization and the effects on readers.