revised

                                        Okonkwo's Downfall in Things Fall Apart

                         For years, which still happen today, people continue to go through obstacles in life and not being able to handle all the challenges they have to face in the end. Such like Okonkwo which lead to his personal misfortune. The obstacles Okonkwo faces in life are a lot. Okonkwo's challenge came from himself. Okonkwo had problems with dealing with his family, trying so hard not to be like his father and making his son to be like someone he wants. As many people in the world, Okonkwo cares too much about what people thinks of him and that is the reason for all the things he done including to his sons Ikemefuna and Nwoye .He not only had problems with his family, but also with the white culture as well as in his own culture, as he becomes frustrated with tribal ideals that conflict with his own, he is a victim of his own anger, dignity, and determination, which eventually he ended up killing himself. The way Okonkwo faces his problems in Things Fall Apart eventually leads to his downfall.

                        Okonkwo was a proud strong man who with working hard was able to bring himself to be a respectable man in his clan. Okonkwo always let his anger get the best of him and showed no emotion to prove he was a real man and better than his father. Okonkwo fear of people thinking he was just like his father made him work hard since he was a child. This made him hate everything his father was made of, which was weakness and being lazy, “Even as a little boy he had resented his father’s failure and weakness” (Achebe 13).when Okonkwo father died he had been in a lot of debt, Okonkwo became obsessed with the idea of manliness in order to get over his father weakness. “It was the fear himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father.”(Achebe 13). Therefore, Okonkwo only showed the emotion of anger. He strongly believed that "To show affection was a sign of weakness the only thing worth demonstrating was strength” (Achebe 28). Okonkwo’s life first began to fall apart when Ikemefuna, thet boy he considered as his son was killed. Ikemefuna went to live with Okonkwo's family because a woman from Umofia was killed in the Ikemefuna home land and they send Ikemefuna to Umofia as way of stating their peace. Umofia decided to leave Ikemefuna in Okonkwo care until they decided what to do with him. Ikemefuna lived with Okonkwo for three years and he considered Ikemefuna as one of his own sons, he actually cared about him. “Even Okonkwo himself became very fond of the body inwardly of course. Okonkwo never showed any emotion openly, unless it was an emotion of anger” (Achebe 28). When he is told that the oracle had decided to kill Ikemefuna, to show everyone he is not weak and is a real man he decides to kill Ikemefuna himself, even when Ogbuefi Ezeudu, a great and fearless warrior told him not kills him he still did.” That boy calls you father. Do not bear a hand in his death” (Achebe 57). Ikemefuna runs toward him saying "My father they have killed me"(Achebe 61). Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him done. He was afraid of being thought weak. He was affected by Ikemefuna death. Okonkwo dealt with a lot ever since that night.” He didn’t eat and sleep for days. Okonkwo did not taste any food for two days after the death of Ikemefuna” (Achebe 63).

                          Another event that led to Okonkwo's life falling apart was when he was thrown out of the clan for seven years. Okonkwo's hopes and dreams from there had begun to fall apart. His hopes of being the highest member of the clan had been destroyed because of what happened. Okonkwo didn’t have his animals or farm. When Okonkwo had accidentally killed a fellow clansman when firing his gun at a traditional farewell ceremony, Okonkwo had to flee the same night. It was a crime against the earth goddess to kill a clansman, and a man who committed it must flee from the land. He could return to the clan after seven years.” It was a crime against the earth goddess to kill a clansman, and a man who committed it must flee from the land, the crime was of two crimes male and female, because it had been inadvertent. He could return to the clan after seven years” (Achebe 124).

                         After seven years had passed, Okonkwo returns to his homeland. Only he returns        to learn that the missionaries had come and made many changes to his village:

Perhaps I have been away too long,' Okonkwo said, almost to himself. But I cannot understand these things you tell me. What is it that has happened to our people? Why have they lost the power to fight? Have you not heard how the white man wiped out Abame?' asked Obierika. I have heard,' said Okonkwo. But I have also heard that Abame people were weak and foolish. Why did they not fight back? Had they no guns and machetes? We would be cowards to compare ourselves with the men of Abame. Their fathers had never dared to stand before our ancestors. We must fight these men and drive them from the land. (Achebe 175).

Okonkwo didn’t listen to the new religious orders because he was scared of losing the social status he worked so hard for. He would fight and die for the way he viewed things and the way his life was before, and he did.

                        He feels betrayed when his son Nwoye transfer to Christianity and join the missionaries. He doesn't see how Nwoye can just give up his beliefs for a religion with values that seems unbelievable. “Now that he had time to think about it his son’s crime stood out in its stark enormity. To abandon the gods of one’s father and go about with a lot of effeminate men clucking like old hens was the very depth of abomination” (Achebe 153). But Nwoye sees the Missionaries as more understanding he thinks about everything his father did and how he treated him and how his father killed Ikemefuma he decides to leave his father and says he doesn’t consider Okonkwo a father. From that moment on Okonkwo thought why he had a son like Nwoye but he realize he wasn’t worth fighting for so he disowns Nwoye as a son, “Nwoye was not worth fighting for. Nwoye joining the Christians affected Okonkwo a lot. Why, he cried in his heart, should he, Okonkwo, of all people, be cursed with such a son?”(Achebe 152).

                        Okonkwo is also very resistant to the rules of the missionaries. If the tribe was to switch over to the Christians then all his hard work and sacrifices such as the killing of his son Ikemefuma and the struggle he made to clear his father's name and show he wasn’t like him, would all have been all for nothing. The event that immediately led to Okonkwo's downfall was when he killed one of the head court messengers. There was a meeting and the head court messengers came to stop the meeting and Okonkwo was just fed up with everything so he killed him and that was his biggest mistake. ”In a flash Okonkwo drew his machete. The messenger crouched to avoid the blow.it was useless. Okonkwo’s machete descended twice and the man’s head lay beside his uniformed body”(Achebe 204).Okonkwo knew that the white man was going to find out and the word will spread quickly, and that they would imprison then kill him as an example. He also knew that Umuofia will not be strong enough and go to war especially since they let the other messengers escape. “Okonkwo stood looking at the dead man. He knew that Umofia would not go to war. He knew because they had let the other messengers escape. They had broken into tumult instead of action”(Achebe 205). Rather than to turn himself in to the white man, Okonkwo decided to kill himself, a sad way to die. In the end Okonkwo could not even be buried with his clansman. “It is an abomination for a man to take his own life. It is an offense against the earth, and a man who commits it will not be buried by his clansman” (Achebe 207). Okonkwo was a great man in a lot of people’s eyes and he could even be buried the right way, his dreams never came true

                        The consequences for all of the stuff the Okonkwo did was losing everything he loved, and which he did little by little and losing his two sons, because he did consider Ikemefuna a son. Okonkwo lost everything he worked for and what he had planned to become in life. For someone who head was held so high to end up taking your own life and not even being able to buried by your clansmen is brutal.” That man was one of the greatest men in Umofia. You drove him to kill himself, and now he will be buried like a dog.”(Achebe 208).

                        From all these events that led to Okonkwo downfall one could see that Okonkwo's life was a total failure. People who fear they may become someone eventually lead themselves to becoming it by trying so hard to be the opposite of the person. Anyone can see that Okonkwo had not achieved his goals which had a lot to do by the way he handled things, but instead, by the end of his life, he had become a failure like his father. As you can see Okonkwo's true devastation was his manliness and the way he viewed things.

                                                                      Work Cited

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. New York: Anchor Books, 1994.

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