Why things fall apart..

The Ibo people believed that the white people were evil because of what they did to the people in Abame. They knew that the white men destroyed their lands and the Ibo people were afraid that the same thing would happen to them. To prepare themselves they would have their weapons to make sure that they and their families were protected. When the white men arrived from the beginning they were trying to convert the Ibo people into Christianity. The white people brought Mr. Brown who was a missionary also and who built a church for his people to pray in. This was good for the white people because they had a place to pray, but for the Ibo people this very bad. This meant that more of the Ibo people who convert so that they could pray to the new gods. This made the Ibo people very angry and it was the complete opposite for the white people. This raised the white people’s spirits but it lowered the Ibo people’s spirits. Then the worse thing happened and it was when Enoch killed an egwugwu. This is the worse crime an Ibo person could commit. The action that the Ibo people took apart in was burning the church. After they burned down the church, everything went down hill. Six Ibo leaders were arrested, a head kotma was killed, and Okonkwo killed himself. Because of the white people, the Ibo tribe feel apart. Their families were converting to another religion and the whole tribe was falling apart, especially Okonkwo’s life. The white people destroyed the Ibo people’s lives even though the Ibo did nothing in the first place. People’s lives were changed forever and no one would be able to regain them and it was all because of the white people.

Things Okonkwo does to others...

Okonkwo treats people with disrespect and looks down upon them. He thinks that everyone has to be manly and can’t show emotion. If someone does show emotion Okonkwo disciplines them. An example of this was when his second wife went to get her haircut and she wasn’t back in time for dinner. Okonkwo waited till she got home and then threatened to kill her by sticking a gun to her head. He only cares about himself rather than others. If someone isn’t doing something his way he will yell and beat them. He thinks that he is god like and that everyone should be like him. He wants his children to be manly and not be failures like his father was. The reason why Okonkwo is like this is so that he wont turn up to be like his father who is a failure and has no future in his life. When Nwoye left to be with the missionaries and Okonkwo heard about this, he tried to kill him. He tried to choke him and took his anger out on Nwoye. Okonkwo expresses his anger in a physical manner. Okonkwo has so much on his mind, most of it being anger, so his way of letting it go is being physical. I think that you the worse thing you can do is to kill a family member and Okonkwo did this. He killed Ikemufuna even though Ikemufuna did nothing. He killed his innocent “son” and Ikemufuna had made such an impact on people especially Nwoye. He was an older brother for Nwoye and taught him ways to be strong, but Okonkwo ended this. Overall, Okonkwo is rude, and has no respect for anyone but himself.

Thoughts about Okonkwo

My thoughts on Okonkwo are that I think he is rude. He is rude, because he beat his wife because she got a couple of leafs off of the banana tree. He hit Nwoye because he was crying and Okonkwo doesn’t think that a man should cry. I also don’t like him because he wants to be the complete opposite of his father. He thinks that he has to be manly so that his people will not think that he is weak. An example of him that shows that he doesn’t want to be weak was when he killed Ikefuma. He was told not to kill Ikefuma, because he was considered a father. “That boy calls you father. Do not bear a hand in his death.” (57) HE thought that if he didn’t kill his son, he would be considered weak and that was the last thing he wanted to be known as. “Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being thought weak.” (57) He does not want to be thought of being lazy either so he is always working and ordering people around. I think Okonkwo doesn’t mean to be mean, he just doesn’t want to end up like his father so he treats everyone like they are not as important.