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Detailed View Of Okonkwo Character In Things Fall Apart
Detailed View Of Okonkwo Character In Things Fall Apart
Detailed View Of Okonkwo Character In Things Fall Apart
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In Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, particularly in its depiction of the Ibo culture, masculinity is emphasized and seen as a sign of success, a reason for respect, and a strong reputation. The role and different aspects of masculinity in the the text are shown most clearly through the main character, Okonkwo. In Achebe’s novel, masculinity is shown through possessions and titles, control over women, strength, and in Okonkwo’s case destructive aggression in place of showing emotions. In Ibo culture, a man’s social standing revolves around his possessions, which include his titles, his land, crops, houses, and in the view of the culture, his wives. Along with being respected for what they own, men in the culture are also respected for strength. Not only does a man of the Ibo culture draw respect from gaining wives, he asserts strength by being able to dominate and control them. Okonkwo, for example, frequently beats his wives and children. The novel speculates on whether he is truly a cruel man, or simply is driven by “the fear of failure and of weakness.” (Achebe 10). This shows that strength is preferable in the realm of masculinity, men avoid signs of …show more content…
He is respected and feared by the other villagers, as well as by his wife and children who have learned to obey him as master of the house. Okonkwo’s family has this level of respect for him partially due to violence. When one of his wives unwittingly kills one of his banana trees, Okonkwo beats her mercilessly in yet another outburst of violence justified in the culture by masculinity. His aggression and strength overcompensate in place of showing emotion, which the text explains as a way to ensure he is not compared to Unoka. The author explains Okonkwo’s overcompensation as “the fear of himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father.” (Achebe 10). Okonkwo expresses himself through violence to avoid seeming emotional and
Okonkwo is one of the most powerful men in the Ibo tribe. In his tribe, he is both feared and honored. This is evident by this quote, "Okonkwo was well known throughout the nine villages and even beyond... [He] brought honor to his tribe by throwing Amalinze the Cat..."(3) This suggests that in Okonkwo's society, power is attained by making a name for yourself in any way possible, even if that means fighting and wrestling to get your fame. Although honor is a good thing, when people have to fight to gain it, it becomes an object of less adoration. Okonkwo's "prosperity was visible in his household... his own hut stood behind the only gate in the red walls. Each of his three wives had her own hut... long stacks of yams stood out prosperously in [the barn]... [Okonkwo] offers prayers on the behalf of himself, his three wives, and eight children." (14) Okonkwo has also worked and tended to his crops in a very zealous fashion, and drives everyone around him to work as hard as he does. Because of this, he earns his place as one of Umuofia's most powerful men. In many cultures, a big family is a source of pride. Although Okonkwo is not always pleased by his children and wives, it also brings him a source of pride to have three wives and eight children. Large families mean that the head of the family is able to support all of them. Okonkwo's devotion to his crops and family gives to him the respect that any father and husband deserves, and in his culture, being able to fight and kill as well gives him even more influence and power.
The novel Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe is a story that opens the reader's mind to an entirely different way of living in a Nigerian village. Achebe was born in Nigeria in 1930, perhaps this is why he writes a whole book on a Nigerian village and introduces to us the ways of life for the Nigerian people. From the first page of the book to the last, Achebe allows the reader to enter the mind of the main character Okonkwo. Okonkwo is the leader of his village and is very respected for his many achievements. Although Okonkwo means well for his village, the novel invites the reader to see him has a flawed character who eventually suffers from the consequences of bad "masculine" decisions he makes throughout the book.
Okonkwo is a man of action, he would rather settle things with his strength rather than talk it out with the person he is mad at. This is very unsympathetic because not only is he going to use violence towards others, he is doing it just because he can not get his point across with using his words. This quote shows that he does not care towards others emotions because he would rather just fight them than talk it out. Another quote that shows Okonkwo’s unsympathetic behavior is,“He rules the household with a heavy hand” (Achebe 13). Okonkwo is shown to be someone who disciplines where he sees fit, if he does not like what is going on then there might be a high chance that the heavy hand is going to come down onto you. It shows how unsympathetic Okonkwo is because it shows how he might not care about his family’s feelings towards getting hit when they disobey him. His wives are more often beaten, especially Ekwefi, who has been beaten almost to death because Okonkwo was in a bad mood. It shows that he lets his emotions get the best of him and he does not control them very well, he would rather let it all out violently than talking it out with the people that he is mad at. Those quotes show how Okonkwo can be seen as a very unsympathetic person from his
In Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, the theme of perceived masculinity is prominent and portrayed as a critical characteristic which has the potential to shape clans, families, and the safety of others. Because of the emphasis placed on masculinity, women are widely disregarded and downplayed, as they are seen as property. In African culture men are revered due to their warrior-like natures that can uphold the functionality of a clan, but frowned upon when deemed as weak; the result of this fear of weakness led to the dominance of men over women.
1. In traditional Ibo culture, women are not treated as equals and are equivalent to possessions. In a family, the children always belong to the father, not the mother. “I have even heard that in some tribes a man’s children belong to his wife and her family” (74). Okonkwo appears appalled to this blasphemy. It is common and ideal for a husband to possess multiple wives, and men beat their wives for even the smallest infractions. During the Week of Peace, the goddess forbids wife beating, such as when Okonkwo beat Ojiugo. “And when she returned he beat her very heavily …It was unheard of to beat somebody during the sacred week” (29-30). To live in a culture with so many threats to them, women are required to be mentally and emotionally strong.
Okonkwo’s fear of unmanliness is kindled by his father, who was a lazy, unaccomplished man. Okonkwo strives to have a high status from a young age and eventually achieves it. He has a large family, many yams and is well known throughout the village for his valor. He raises his family by his mentality of manliness and is ...
In the situation with his youngest wife, Ojiugo, Okonkwo was waiting for her to bring him his dinner, but to have it to never come due to her leaving the house to get her hair plaited. Okonkwo becomes angered because of this, and when she returned he beat her, even though there should be no violence during the Week of Peace. He had other wives at the time who were in the household that could have gotten his meal at the time, but because he was so overwhelmed with anger that she defied him, he resorted to violence. Okonkwo’s anger was not justified, he did not have to beat his Ekwefi or Ojiugo in either of those situations. The only reason he beaten them in the first place was a way for Okonkwo to assert his dominance and show that he should not be opposed of, that he is “strong.” This is a clear example of toxic masculinity being shown through Okonkwo’s action of the traits of domestic violence and the devaluation of women. Although women are generally considered to be the weaker sex in the Ibo culture, they hold an important role in the tribe as
Okonkwo’s fear leads him to treat members of his family harshly, in particular his son, Nwoye. Okonkwo often wonders how he, a man of great strength and work ethic, could have had a son who was “degenerate and effeminate” (133). Okonkwo thought that, "No matter how prosperous a man was, if he was unable to rule his women and his children (and especially his women) he was not really a man" (45).
The foundation of Okonkwo’s fear of failure and weakness stems from the qualities possessed by Okonkwo’s father, Unoka, and his inability to succeed during his life. As a young boy, Okonkwo had always known and resented that his father was essentially the definition of a failure. Throughout Okonkwo’s childhood, he was constantly reminded of the fact that his father was unsuccessful: “... even now he still remembered how he had suffered when a playmate had told him his father was agbala” (Achebe 13). The word agbala has two different meanings, one referring to a woman and the other meaning a man who has taken no titles in the clan. Titles are an important part of the Ibo culture because they show a man’s achievement and success in the clan.
Because his father borrowed from others without means of returning, lived off of others, and never made a stable life for himself and his family, Okonkwo does the opposite in his life. Normally a son would inherit his father’s barn, but because his father was unmanly and “had a miserable harvest” (Achebe 16), “there was no barn to inherit” (16). Okonkwo “hate[d] everything that his father Unokoa had loved” (13) because all that his father did was weak. He makes a stable life for himself and his family by producing yams and stocking up his barn. Okonkwo’s idea of manliness is also more aggressive than the clan. When he is suggested to not take part in the killing of Ikemefuna, Okonkwo not only was there, but he “cut him down” (61) because of the fear “of being thought weak” (61). Whenever Okonkwo thought he or a member of his family was being thought of as weak, he would either beat them, physically, or himself, emotionally, up. He is more aggressive and intolerant of unmanliness because of the fear of becoming like his
by Chinua Achebe, Okonkwo depicts his masculinity in many different ways, even if it hurts the people closest to him. He feels it is necessary to display his manliness so he does not end up like his father Unoka. “He had no patience with unsuccessful men. He had no patience with his father” (4). Okonkwo correlates virility with aggression and feels the only emotion he should show is anger, leaving him no way to cope with the death of his culture.
Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart, includes a narrative about protagonist Okonkwo and how he perceives his wives, friends, father, and children based on how they measure up to societal customs which expect each to carry out and stay within his or her given role. Okonkwo is no different in frequency of judgement than Marlow. While each author has his own respective style, both convey the effect that preconception has on perception. Okonkwo is first described to hate his father: “...even as a little boy he had resented his father's failure and weakness…” (13). Diction such as “failure” and “weakness” aid the reader in understanding the taboo surrounding frailty in Umuofia and specifically the African culture. This taboo is emphasized by the
It is another to sympathies for a man who believes he is powerful and respected by many when in reality, he is feared by his own family and that is another reason that leads Okonkwo to his downfall. He started positive, motivated but down the line, Okonkwo treats his wives and children very harshly. When the author mentioned, “Okonkwo ruled his household with a heavy hand. His wives, especially the youngest, lived in perpetual fear of his fiery temper, and so did his little children” (pg.13). This is not power but a weakness when Okonkwo uses power to rule his own house, detaching himself from the emotional connection with this family rather than being frightening to live with. The sign of “gentleness” as like his father means weakness to Okonkwo even with his own family. Especially his wives, when the narrator demonstrated the lack of emotion to his wife, “Okonkwo was provoked to justifiable anger by his young wife, went to plait her hair at her friend’s house and did not return early enough to cook the afternoon meal… He walked back to his obi to await Ojiugo’s return. And when she returned he beat her very heavily. In his anger he had forgotten that it was the Week of Peace…But Okonkwo was not the man to stop beating somebody half –way through, not even for fear of a goddess” (pg.29-30). Okonkwo does not even fear the goddess and the Week of Peace and ends up beating his wife to show that he owes
His flaw is his fear of failure and weakness, which dominated his entire life. Okonkwo feared that he would resemble his father, who was weak, gentle, had no titles, and had many debts. This causes Okonkwo to act with violence and anger is the only emotion he shows. His vicious acts cause him to have conflicts with his family and even Umuofia. For example, he punishes his wife and breaks the week of peace which is important to the traditions of his culture. Next, Okonkwo goes with his clan when Ikemefuna is to be killed as shown by this quote, “Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being thought weak” (Achebe 61). His last act of violence is when he attempts to instigate war by killing a white court
Okonkwo sees his father’s gentleness as a feminine trait. He works hard to be as masculine as possible so that he will be the opposite of his father and overcome the shame his father brought to his family. Okonkwo deals with this struggle throughout the entire book, hiding the intense fear of weakness behind a masculine façade (Nnoromele 149). In order to appear masculine, he is often violent. In his desire to be judged by his own worth and not by the worth of his effeminate father, Okonkwo participates in the killing of a boy he sees as a son, even though his friends and other respected tribe members advise him against it. (Hoegberg 71). Even after the killing of Ikamefuna, Okonkwo hides his feelings of sadness because the emotions are feminine to him. He goes so far as to ask himself, “when did you become a shivering old woman” (Achebe 65), while he is inwardly grieving. The dramatic irony of the secret fears that Okonkwo has will open the reader’s eyes to how important gender identity is to him. This theme is also presented among Okonkwo’s children. He sees his oldest son, Nwoye, as feminine because he does not like to work as hard as his father (Stratton 29). When Nwoye eventually joins the Christian church, Okonkwo sees him as even more feminine. On the other hand, Okonkwo’s