Okonkwo as a tragic hero in things fall apart

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About Chinua Achebe:

Born: 16 November 1930, Ogidi. Nigerian Protector. Full Name: Albert Chinualumongu Achebe. Died: 21 March 2013 (Age 82) Boston, Massachusetts, United States. Occupation: David and Marianna Fisher University Professor and Professor of African Studies Broun  University  Nationality : Nigerian  Ethnicity : Igbo  Period : 1958 – 2013

 

“Okonkwo as a Tragic Hero” in Things Fall Apart :

His famous works:

1. The African Trilogy 
2. Things Fall Apart 
3. No Longer of Ease

4. Arrows of God 
5. A Man of the people and 
6. Anthills of the savamoh 

About things fall apart:

 

“Things Fall Apart” is Chinua Achebe’s first novel and was published in 1958 a time often called the Nigerian Renaissance in that period a large number began to create a powerful new literature that drew on the traditional oral literature European literature, and the changing time in Nigeria. Things Fall Apart is a story about Okonkwo and how life falls apart. Okonkwo than hangs himself for unknown reason. Achebe we can compare and contrast two main characters that are actually very different, even though related.
Okonkwo, the main character in Chinua Achebe novel Things Fall Apart, was a tragic figure. Okonkwo was not cruel man. Achebe expresses his views about misrepresentation of African by condor and Joyce carry.

This map shows the character of things fall apart:-

Okonkwo as a tragic hero in things fall apart:-

In Chinua Achebe’s novel “Things Fall Apart” Okonkwo is a tragic Hero. Okonkwo Aristotle‘s poetics defines a Tragic Hero as a good man of high status who can display a tragic flow ‘Hamartia’ and experience a dramatic reversal ‘ Peripatetia ’as well as an intense moment of recognition ‘One agonizes’.

               Okonkwo is a leader and hardworking member of the Igbo community of Umuofia whose tragic flow is his great fear of weakness and failure .Okonkwo fall from grace kin the Igbo community and eventual suicide makes Okonkwo a tragic hero by Aristotle definition.

                Okonkwo is a man of action, a man of war and a member of high status in the Igbo Village .Okonkwo’s hard work had made him a wealthy farmer and a recognized individual wars amongst them nine village of Umuofia and beyond.

              Okonkwo’s tragic flow is not that he was afraid of work. But rather his fear of weakness and failure that stems from his Father’s Unoka unproductive life and disgraceful death.

                “Okonkwo whole life was dominated by fear, the fear of failure and weakness it was not external but lay deep within him. It was the fear of himself .lest he should be found to resemble his Father”.

                  Okonkwo’s Father is a lazy, carefree man whom has a reputation of being poor and his wife and children have just barely enough to eat they money because he never paid back. Okonkwo’s father has never thought Okonkwo’s what is right and what is wrong, and as a result Okonkwo has to interpret how to be a good man.


                   Okonkwo’s self – interpretation leads to him to conclude that a good man is someone who is the exact opposite of his father .Okonkwo’s things that,

“No matter how prosperous a man was if he was unable to tulles his woman and his children he was not really a man”

               Okonkwo’s wrestles with his fear that any sign of weakness will cause him to lose control of his family , position in the village , and even himself , like money heroes of classical tragedy , Okonkwo’s tragic flow , fear , also makes him excessively proud. Okonkwo downfall is a result of the changes created by the British colonizers to Igbo.

               The introduction of the colonizers into the novel cuisses Okonkwo’s tragic flow to be exacerbated .Okonkwo construes change as weakness, and , as a result of his interpretation, Okonkwo only knows how to react to change through anger and strength .

               Following Okonkwo’s seven year exile , the village Okonkwo one knew has changed due to the influence of Christianity and the influence of the British missionaries and officers . Okonkwo’s initial reaction is to arrant the clan against the colonizers and drive the British people out of Igbo.

“He had put a knife on the things that had us together and we have fallen Apart”

                  Okonkwo’s has always used his strength and courage to protect the communality from destabilizing forces , and as Okonkwo is a traditional man , the introduction of Christianity poses a threat to all the values , morals and beliefs he sought to protect.

                 The Igbo culture had made Okonkwo a hero, but the Igbo culture changed with the coming of the British colonizers. Okonkwo, a hero would rather die than be humiliated by hi s enemies and by committing suicide Okonkwo prevented the European colonizers getting revenge.

“Everyone has a flow , nobody is perfect”. Okonkwo had many flows which qualifies him as a tragic hero.”

“ A Tragic hero by definition is” , 

“A literary character who makes an error in judgment or has a fatal flow that , combined with fate and external forces , bring on tragedy”

                     Every tragic hero begins his or her journey with a rise to for me .this aspect is very evident in Things Fall Apart ; Okonkwo had quite the celebrity lifestyle , from being able to win a competitive wrestling match against another legendary wrestler.

                     Okonkwo is a tragic hero in the classical; although he is a superior character, his tragic flow the equation of manliness with rashness anger, and violence being about his own destruction. In this novel Okonkwo as tragic hero vital roll.

                   

                          That was not the first encounter with Okonkwo’s tragic flow , his emotionally challenged mind state , nor would it be the last .in today’s society woman are known for being physically respected .especially by man 

                 There are two types of people in this world, those who solve their problems in a calm matter and those who use force to solve their problems. Okonkwo is obviously one of those people who solve their problems with force.

                Okonkwo, the last characteristic of a tragic hero is that their tragic flow must lead them to their downfall. Okonkwo is a tragic hero because he exhibits all the qualities that a tragic hero should have, a rise to fame and tragic flow in the character that leads to their demise.

                 Let us remember that in Aristotle creation of the term a tragic hero, he said that a tragic hero was a character who was basically a good person, that undermined their goodness and lead them the path to tragedy. The character of Okonkwo in Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall A part” is a literary example of a tragic hero, a hero who has many admirable qualities, but also a flow that leads to his demise.

                Okonkwo is a tragic hero in the typical sense : although he is a superior character , his tragic flow , the equation of manliness with rashness , anger , violence , and arrogance beings about his own destruction. Okonkwo, the main protagonist of the novel, expresses many stereotypical personality traits of a hero.

                Achebe also found it distressing that many African began to believe the western stereotypes of African culture were true and, as a result, were turning away from their culture to become more western.

                 Thing Fall Apart takes place in the mid –to –late 1800s and essentially tells two stories. The first is the story of Okonkwo - a successful 160 former and respected leaders in his village despite his violent temper and unforgiving mindset.

                  Achebe’s ability to communicate the tragedy of Okonkwo’s experience to western readers, in spite of Okonkwo’s decidedly unsympathetic character, works one of the novel’s greatest achievements. Okonkwo’s character is shaped in reaction to his father in a sense, Okonkwo represents a native culture threatened by the coming of Christianity and European ways. Okonkwo is a n exceptional individual who is destroyed by enormous cultural farces, but the potential heroism of his final act of defiance is ironically undercut by his alienation from his clan. 

                In a final ironic commentary on Okonkwo’s misguided heroism, Achebe tells his reader that the district commissioner plans to include a paragraph on Okonkwo’s unusual behavior in his projected book the pacification of the primitive tribes of the lower Niger, a reminder that Okonkwo’s inability to understand cultural change is a small reflection of a more blindness.

Conclusion:-

                  At the end of the novel, Okonkwo stands alone, a self proclaimed defender of an inflexible traditionalism that contradicts the true flexibility of his culture.