Themes (DP IB English A: Language and Literature: HL): Revision Note

Below are some themes that could be explored in Things Fall Apart. This list is not exhaustive, and themes often overlap, so consider how these themes may cover other ideas too. Writing about a theme only earns marks once you turn it into an interpretation of what Achebe is doing, so each section below separates the evidence from the argument you can build on it.

Here you will find sections on:

• Culture and identity

• Tradition and gender

• Fate and free will

• Family bonds

Culture and identity

Set in pre-colonial Nigeria, Things Fall Apart examines Igbo culture, as well as the pressure placed upon it by the influence of British culture. Achebe portrays the challenges encountered by villagers who attempt to maintain their identity amid cultural change.

Knowledge and evidence:

• The story describes Igbo marital customs, funeral ceremonies, and festivals, such as Peace Week, by relating events in a community called Umuofia:

  • Through narration, Achebe shows the significance of Igbo tradition

• The novel also portrays the responses of Igbo villagers to colonisation:

  • Obierika speaks of the massacre of the Abame clan by men with guns

  • The men describe their suspicion of white men like “locusts”

• The clash of religious beliefs between Christian missionaries and Igbo villagers brings confusion and violence:

  • Some, who feel misunderstood or oppressed by Igbo culture, like Nwoye, convert to Christianity and learn to read English

  • The village men burn a church, and are tortured and arrested

  • Okonkwo murders the commissioner’s messenger and commits suicide

What is Achebe’s intention?

• Achebe raises questions about the powerful influence of culture on identity

• Achebe highlights the drastic changes within Igbo culture over a short time

• The resolution highlights the indigenous people’s powerlessness against British influence

• Achebe wrote in English while keeping Igbo words untranslated, so the novel itself performs the meeting of cultures it describes

• The clan is never presented as unchanging, since Nwoye and the other converts show that some members had reasons to leave it

Tradition and gender

Chinua Achebe’s novel presents the danger of traditional viewpoints that become rigid and intolerant. In particular, the novel illustrates how extreme patriarchal viewpoints can create conflict and barriers in a community.

Knowledge and evidence:

• The novel highlights patriarchal Igbo traditions:

  • In a domestic dispute, the egwugwu instruct a husband (who has beaten his wife) to take his wife back and treat her better

  • Okonkwo beats his three wives if he thinks they behave poorly

• Initially, Okonkwo’s success is linked to his traditional values:

  • He is a successful, hardworking farmer and a family man who delivers discipline to his three wives and children

• But Okonkwo’s obsession to be unlike his father leads to extreme views:

  • He believes that discussion and pacifism are feminine qualities, and that aggression, physical work, and discipline are masculine qualities

  • His murder of Ikemefuna to prove his masculinity brings him guilt

• Achebe contrasts Okonkwo’s extreme views with characterisations of other more tolerant males in the village:

  • Okonkwo is challenged by Obierika for his violence

  • Okonkwo’s uncle encourages him to be more peaceful and understanding with Nwoye

• Igbo culture itself seems to contradict Okonkwo’s view of gender:

  • Uchendu asks why a common Igbo name is “Nneka”, meaning “Mother is Supreme”

  • He tells Okonkwo that “a man belongs to his fatherland when things are good and life is sweet. But when there is sorrow and bitterness he finds refuge in his motherland”

  • Chielo, the priestess of Agbala, holds an authority no man in the novel can overrule

What is Achebe’s intention?

• Chinua Achebe offers a balanced view of Igbo traditions by showing discriminatory practices that particularly harm women and children

• Achebe presents the damaging consequences of extreme patriarchal views

• He locates the critique inside Igbo culture, which makes it harder to read the novel as just a conflict between Igbo and British values

Fate and free will

Chinua Achebe’s tragedy considers the universal struggle of exerting one’s autonomy against external pressures. The novel illustrates Igbo beliefs regarding personal destiny, but the tragic ending portrays a protagonist whose lack of personal accountability, accompanied by forces beyond his control, lead to his downfall.

Knowledge and evidence:

• The novel highlights Igbo spiritual beliefs, such as the idea of the chi, which relates to the destiny into which a child is born

• However, the Igbo people believe in free will: blaming fate is discouraged, as it’s believed to invite misfortune:

  • One’s chi can be changed according to one’s actions, such as when Okonkwo overcomes childhood poverty

  • Certainly, Okonkwo’s downfall begins when he curses fate for his exile and blames others for his circumstances

• His inability to take control of his anger and manage his chi leads to tragedy:

  • Nevertheless, Okonkwo’s suicide is presented as the result of intolerant and aggressive settlers as well as his own transgressions

• Igbo belief itself points in both directions:

  • Achebe’s narrator says a man’s chi agrees with his own choices: “The Ibo people have a proverb that when a man says yes his chi says yes also”

  • Okonkwo’s father Unoka is told by the Oracle that his failure is his own, and not his chi

What is Achebe’s intention?

• The tragedy, Things Fall Apart, examines an individual’s ability to exert free will in a pressured, changing environment

• Achebe explores the result of blaming misfortune on fate rather than taking accountability of one’s own actions

• However, the novel also depicts citizens powerless to control their future in the face of external forces, suggesting the inevitability of change

Family bonds

Achebe’s Things Fall Apart highlights the importance of family, while also showing the difficulties that arise from clashing identities and belief systems. The novel explores how intolerance can create division and lead to isolation.

Knowledge and evidence:

• The novel illustrates the bond between the Igbo people and their ancestors:

  • Instructions are delivered by well-respected elders and Oracles

• Achebe highlights the important role of the mother and father in the family:

  • Ekwefi tells fables to her daughter, and she and Okonkwo go to great lengths to help Ezinma recover from her illness

  • Nwoye’s mother plays an important role in helping Ikemefuna to settle

  • The elders exile Okonkwo to his motherland to change his ways

• Okonkwo’s attitude to his family is extreme and his actions often hypocritical:

  • While Okonkwo is deeply committed to Igbo traditions, he kills Ikemefuna despite Ezeudu’s warning not to take part

  • But he believes that the village’s submission to the missionaries and District Commissioner betrays their ancestors

• Achebe presents Okonkwo’s lack of accountability as one of his flaws:

  • He forces his will on Nwoye and believes his son has turned his back on his father when he converts to Christianity

  • Okonkwo creates a damaging cycle as his son denies his roots

• Family in the novel is wider than the household:

  • The umunna, the extended kinsmen, feed Okonkwo in exile and gather for his farewell feast

  • Achebe uses these gatherings to show a society that governs itself, which is what colonial rule later replaces

What is Achebe’s intention?

• In Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe raises issues about generational divides

• Achebe highlights the damage caused by intolerant attitudes towards the younger generation

• The novel portrays the significant role of community and extended family on the fate of its characters

Sources:

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. William Heinemann, 1958.

Fernandes, Spoorthy S. “Destiny Unraveled: The Conflict of Fate and Free Will in ‘Things Fall Apart’.” International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention, vol. 12, no. 7, 2023.