Themes Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.

The Struggle Between Change and Tradition

As a story about a culture on the verge of change, Things Fall Apart deals with how the prospect and reality of change affect various characters. The tension about whether change should be privileged over tradition often involves questions of personal status. Okonkwo, for example, resists the new political and religious orders because he feels that they are not manly and that he himself will not be manly if he consents to join or even tolerate them. To some extent, Okonkwos resistance of cultural change is also due to his fear of losing societal status. His sense of self-worth is dependent upon the traditional standards by which society judges him. This system of evaluating the self inspires many of the clans outcasts to embrace Christianity. Long scorned, these outcasts find in the Christian value system a refuge from the Igbo cultural values that place them below everyone else. In their new community, these converts enjoy a more elevated status.

The villagers in general are caught between resisting and embracing change and they face the dilemma of trying to determine how best to adapt to the reality of change. Many of the villagers are excited about the new opportunities and techniques that the missionaries bring. This European influence, however, threatens to extinguish the need for the mastery of traditional methods of farming, harvesting, building, and cooking. These traditional methods, once crucial for survival, are now, to varying degrees, dispensable. Throughout the novel, Achebe shows how dependent such traditions are upon storytelling and language and thus how quickly the abandonment of the Igbo language for English could lead to the eradication of these traditions.

Important Themes in Things Fall Apart: Change vs. Tradition

Important themes in Things Fall Apart include the struggle between change and tradition: Interpretation #1: The following is a hypothetical conversation between Nwoye and a tribal elder: Nwoye: I don't agree with some of these traditions. Tribal Elder: My dad killed twins, drank palm wine, talked to egwuwu, opressed women, and prayed to Agbala. His dad killed twins, drank palm wine, talked to egwuwu, opressed women, and prayed to Agbala. I kill twins, drink palm wine, talk to egwuwu, opress women, and pray to Agbala. Now get out before I beat you. Interpretation #2: The Ibo need to scrap their traditions, implement national health care, start a dialogue with enemy spirits who terrorize them, rewrite their laws, and collect all their yams and divide them equally at the end of the harvest so everybody will be equal.

Interpretation #3: Confronted with change, individual members of Ibo society react differently. Those who stand to gain from change--the outcasts, titleless, and opressed--welcome it. Those who have risen to positions of authority by following the old way--Okonkwo, for example--resist change. The battle between the old and the new is highlighted by the arrival of Christian missionaries and colonial authority. Okonkwo and Obierika recognize that many of their clansmen adopt the new ways. Obierika realizes resistance is futile. Okonkwo chops the head off a colonial messenger, something the old tribe would have found heroic, but something the new tribe does not endorse.

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His mother was Princess ta whose father was Emperor Tenji. He was therefore the younger full-blood brother of Princess ku. His consort was Princess Yamanobe, daughter of Emperor Tenji, thus his cousin. His life is known from the Nihon Shoki, and his personality emerges through such poetry anthologies as Kaifs and Man'ysh. As a poet, tsu is best known for the letters he exchanged with Lady Ishikawa[citation needed]. Prince tsu was a popular and able figure who was a likely successor of his father to the imperial throne, but was forced to commit suicide after false charges of rebellion were laid against him by Empress Jit in order to promote her own son, Prince Kusakabe, to the position of crown prince.

Change is a constant theme in Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, and the change in the Igbo's way of life is the main source of conflict among the people of Umofia. Things Fall Apart chronicles the lives of

Africans of the Igbo tribe in the midst of British colonization during the late 1800's. The British missionaries bring both improvements and detriments to the Igbo way of life. They give the tribe a new system of law, a network of trade, and most important, a new religion: Christianity; however, not all Igbo embrace the changes that the missionaries make. Oknonkwo, a man of high status in Umofia, denounces the missionaries, while his son Nwoye embraces them. Nwoye sees the missionaries and their new religion as an outlet for all of his frustrations with the Igbo culture, frustrations that stem from the murder of his best friend Ikemefuna. Another village kills an Iguedo woman, and for recompense the offending village gives Iguedo a young female virgin and a young boy. The boy's name is Ikemefuna, and through the course of three years he becomes Nwoye's best friend. The Oracle of the Hills, the strongest voice in the Igbo tribe, condemns Ikemefuna to death because the Igbo religion sees Ikemefuna as an abomination to its earth goddess. The Oracle's death sentence is carried out according to Igbo customs, and Ikemefuna is killed; Nwoye thinks this murder is senseless. The murder of Ikemefuna affects him deeply; "Something seemed to give way inside him, like the snapping of a

tightened bow." Achebe goes on to highlight the fact that Nwoye does not cry, instead he hangs limp. Losing faith in the customs of the Igbo religion, seeds of doubt are planted within Nwoye leading him to question the practices of his tribe. Nwoye continues to doubt the validity of the Igbo's religious practices, chief among these doubts is the power of the Iyi-uwa and the existence of the Ogbanje. An Ogbanje, an evil spirit, that continues to reincarnate itself only to die again as a baby. Only when the Ogbanje's Iyi-uwa is destroyed does the spirit lose its power. One of Okonkwo's daughters is believed to be an Ogbanje, so when she is old enough she gives the medicine man the location of her buried Iyi-uwa. After much deliberation the girl decides on a spot in the forest and the medicine man begins to dig. All of the bystanders, except for Nwoye, go off to the side leaving the medicine man do his work. Therefore, Nwoye is the only one who realizes that the Iyi-uwa is actually planted in that spot by the medicine man. The illegitimacy of the Iyi-uwa, along with the practice of killing twins babies, and the murder of Ikemefuna tears a gaping hole into his faith; this hole will be filled Christianity. The Christian missionaries arrive in the villages of Umofia looking for converts. Those who convert first are those who have traditional been shunned in Igbo society. The villagers, especially Okonkwo, do not realize that there are others who feel like outsiders as a result of the Igbo culture as well; Nwoye is one of these people. He forsakes his father's wishes and converts to Christianity, and he is lauded for this fact by the missionaries. Blessed is he who forsakes his father and his mother for my sake." Nwoye's conversion to Christianity directly relates to his relationship with Ikemefuna and his subsequent murder because of Igbo religious customs. Without Ikemefuna's death, there would not be a major event that forces him to question the beliefs of his people. If not for the Igbo traditions he considers barbaric, the killing of infant twins, and the hoax of the Iyi-uwa there would not be a reason for his continuing doubt in the Igbo religion that leads to his conversion to Christianity. Nwoye sees the missionaries and their religion as an outlet for his confusion and non-belief in the Igbo religion; the catalyst of Nwoye's non-belief is Ikemefuna's murder.

Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, is a powerful novel based on a conception of humans as self-reflexive beings and a definition of culture as a set of control mechanisms.
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, is a powerful novel about the social changes that occurred when the white man first arrived on the African continent. In attempting to understand behavior in settings different from those in which the discipline evolved, causes for the failure to articulate the relationship between the individual and social change are explored. The novel is based on a conception of humans as self-reflexive beings and a definition of culture as a set of control mechanisms.

Things Fall Apart, is the story of Okonkwo, an elder, in the Igbo tribe. He is a fairly successful man who earned the respect of the tribal elders. Okonkwo's father was laughed at by the villagers, and was considered a failure. However, this was not true of Okonkwo who lived in a modest home : Okonkwo's prosperity was visible in his household. He had a large compound enclosed by a thick wall of red earth. His own hut, or obi, stood immediately behind the only gate in the red walls. Each of his three wives had their own hut, which together formed a half moon behind the obi. The barn was built against one end of the red walls, and long stacks of yams stood out prosperously in it. (P. 10) Unfortunately, the clash of the cultures that occurs when the white man's missionaries come to Africa in an attempt to convert the tribal members, causes Okonkwo to lash out at the white man and results in his banishment from the tribe. Okonkwo had a bad temper which he often displayed: 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. Perhaps down in his heart Okonwo was not a cruel man. But his whole life was dominated by fear of failure and of weakness. (P. 9) The cracks within Okonkwo's character are not so much external as internal, manifestations of those aspects of his being that have been his greatest strengths: acting without thinking; never showing any emotion besides anger; inflexibility; fear of being perceived as weak and, therefore, womanly. Slowly, these characteristics that have served Okonkwo so well in the past, begin to alter the direction of his life. The first such incident occurs when Okonkwo accidentally breaks the Week of Peace. Angered by his second wife, who has forgotten to prepare a meal for him, Okonkwo beats her mercilessly, forgetting about the time of propitiation for the Goddess of Peace.