Okonkwo's Exile In Things Fall Apart

How is it possible for one the greatest men in lower Niger that had pride in the Ibo culture ended his own life and viewed as an abomination due to his actions? Since the beginning of the novel “Things Fall Apart” Okonkwo always strived to be a superior man in his clan with his hard work ethic to become something better than his abomination of a father that he had. Later throughout the novel he achieved his goals and became a high titled man in Umuofia. So what caused Okonkwo to end his own life? After his unfortunate exile he realized that he had lost everything that he had worked so hard and the Umuofia people had been overcome by the white people and their Christian culture. Chinua Achebe, author of the brilliant dramatic nonfiction novel

“Things Fall Apart”, presents the reader with series of significant events that result in the downfall of Okonkwo and how each affected his life.
During the final chapters of Okonkwo life he faced several major confronting issues that assisted him to the dramatic downfall; one of these first events had an overarching cause to other events, the murder of Ikemifuna. When Okonkwo was informed of the news he shows no signs of emotion. Okonkwo’s life had always been ruled by fear, anger, and pride throughout this life, but these qualities become hazards because he never learned how to control them. Ever since the death of Ikemifuna the relationship between Okonkwo and Nwoye becomes less stable. “Something seemed to give away inside him, like the snapping of a tightened bow” (Page 61) this event was the major stepping stone that drove Nwoye away from his family to join the white Christians. These moments where fueling Okonkwo’s anger and as the novel continued, these crucial events being to grow exponentially on top of one another till Okonkwo could withstand the continues &&&& no more.
More drastic events happen afterward the exile that slowly causes Okonkwo to lose hope in his old traditional native ways of life and caused him to lose hope.

Later Okonkwo’s oldest son Nwoye was absorbed into the white people’s growing church system and abandoned his native Ibo culture. Nwoye had doubted the Ibo culture ever since Ikemfuna’s death. Okonkwo heard about his actions he became extremely furious and confronted Nwoye about what he had heard about him earlier that day saying, “Where have you been? Answer me before I kill you!” (Page 151) Nwoye decided to leave his family and fueled Okonkwo’s hatred for the white people even more than before by portraying to his younger sons, “You have all seen the great abomination of your brother. Now he is no longer my son or your brother.” (Page 172) Not only had they cause the extinction of a native nearby village, but they had caused separation between groups. From this moment onwards Okonkwo does not believe that the whites can live and thrive in Umuofia peacefully without causing conflict and decides to be put into action to stop these men from the destruction of their culture. This caused Okonkwo to be madly insane towards the white people when he returns home to Umuofia because of his

prejudgment.
When the seven year sentence of exile had been completed Okonkwo and his family had to start over, but they received no attention due to the whites. Okonkwo’s tried to save his clan form the weakness that had overcame all of the people of Umuofia as he had claimed that, “What has happened to our people? Why have they lost the power to fight?” to show that the people had become frightened to fight back to save their native culture for extinction. Even though Okonkwo’s last effort to start a war was the murder of the commissioner, it was not enough to receive the clans support for his action to rebel. Fear had always been Okonkwo’s greatest weakness, he feared for what had to come in the future to Umuofia and decided to end his life in the disrespectful way of the Ibo culture by hanging himself and was proclaimed an abomination because of it.
All of these severe tragic events were massive causes behind what the real purpose of Okonkwo’s downfall was actually about. Even though Okonkwo was highly respected he felt as if there was nothing in his power to and his fear of failure blinded him to and his anger got the best of him at the worst possible time. All his efforts to save the Ibo people he accomplished nothing. After all the years of hard work he resulted to a fate resembling his father which he had always resented, a failure.