Things Fall Apart

Achebe’s novel begins with his central character, Okonkwo, who is “well known throughout the nine villages” (3). About 20 years ago, he won a fight against an undefeated wrestler, Amalinze, which established his honor. “Tall and huge” (3), and “severe” in his face, Okonkwo has “no patience with unsuccessful men,” especially his father, Unoka (4).

Unoka, as Okonkwo sees him, “was lazy and improvident and was quite incapable of thinking about tomorrow” (5). Though Unoka had been tall like his son, before he passed away 10 years earlier, he was “very thin and had a slight stoop” (5). Okonkwo remembers his father playing the flute, drinking palm-wine, and celebrating the harvest with others in the village. Everyone saw him as “a loafer,” and “his wife and children had barely enough to eat” (6). He was constantly in debt to others.

Okoye, a musician friend of Unoka’s, once visited to ask that Unoka return a debt of 200 cowries. After Unoka broke a kola nut and prayed to his ancestors for protection, and after he played his flute to distract from talk of war, and after Okoye pronounced a series of