Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart

Chinua Achebe's post-colonial novel Things Fall Apart revolutionizes the perception of the colonization of Africa not only by showcasing the native culture and their perspective of the missionaries arrival, but also by showing the internal and external battles many Africans who converted to Christianity faced. The main character in the book is Okonkwo, a tribal leader who rose above his father's reputation of laziness and improvidence (Achebe 2) to gain the respect of his village. However, Okonkwo's eldest son, Nwoye, has proven to have many of the same traits as his grandfather. Nwoye is first introduced as "Okonkwo's first son, Nwoye, was then twelve years old but was already causing his father great anxiety for his incipient laziness."(11)

He taught him to be the man Okonkwo expects while still preserving his humanity, something his father had never known how to do. During Ikemefuna's stay Nwoye finally begins to gain Okonkwo's approval. When the oracle decides that Ikemefuna must be killed for his father's indiscretions, Nwoye is crushed. Achebe describes Nwoye's reaction as "As soon as his father walked in, that night, Nwoye knew Ikemefuna had been killed, and something gave way inside him, like the snapping of a tightened bow. He did not cry. He just hung limp."(53) He goes on to explain that Nwoye felt a similar feeling during the last harvest, after hearing the wail of infant twins left in the forest to

When missionaries arrive in the village, one being a white man, they become something of a spectacle to the clan's men and women. As the white man speaks through an interpreter about the one true God and the Holy Trinity many onlookers leave, believing the men are mad, yet Nwoye is captivated by the new faith. "It was not the mad logic of the Trinity that captivated him. He did not understand it. It was the poetry of the new religion, something felt in the marrow. The hymn about brothers who sat in darkness and in fear seemed to answer a vague and persistent question that haunted his young soul - the questions of the twins crying in the bush and of Ikemefuna who was killed." (128) Nwoye kept his attraction to the new religion a secret, but always made sure to listen to the men preach in the market. When a cousin of Okonkwo informs him of Nwoye's presence at the newly built church, Okonkwo attacks his son. Nwoye is exiled from his family for abandoning the traditions of their ancestors and decides to go back to his home tribe of Umuofia to study in the newly formed