Literary Elements in Achebe's Things Fall Apart
Teach Students Literary Analysis Skills Using This African Novel
May 28, 2009
You can help students understand the process of literary analysis when reading Achebe’s novel Things Fall Apart [Anchor Books, 1959] by focusing these disparate literary elements on a common motif: Okonkwo’s anger. The following examples of literary elements in Things Fall Apart all centralize on this one feature. Encourage students to identify these examples and grow more acquainted with the main character’s motives.
Internal Conflict
An internal conflict is a struggle within one character. Two characters in the novel experience internal conflicts. Okonkwo feels love for his daughter, Ezinma, and his adopted son, Ikemefuma, but he cannot show it. The only emotion Okonkwo feels a man must show is anger, so he hides his affection for both children.
Further, Nwoye, Okonkwo’s eldest son, reacts to Okonkwo’s frequent displays of anger. He struggles to earn Okonkwo’s love and approval and diminish Okonkwo’s anger toward him. For example, he starts complaining about women because it makes his father smile. Later, Nwoye struggles with his decision to ultimately leave his father and join the Christian church, where he finds acceptance.
External Conflict
Several types of external conflict exist, including man vs. man, man vs. society, and man vs. nature. One example of an external conflict occurs when Okonkwo breaks the week of peace by striking and nearly killing his third and youngest wife, Ojiugo. Achebe describes that “in his anger he had forgotten that it was the Week of Peace” (29). This conflict occurs due to Okonkwo’s inability to control this overwhelming emotion.
Indirect Characterization
Indirect characterization is revealed in a character’s thoughts and actions. Okonkwo’s anger toward his father, a man who achieved little in his lifetime, dictates his own search for identity. His actions show that he strives to be the exact opposite of his father, Unoka, in every way. Where his father was kind and fun-loving, Okonkwo is sullen and hard-working to a fault.
Symbolism in Things Fall Apart
Even the symbolism in Things Fall Apart speaks to Okonkwo’s solitary emotion. The following excerpt describes a vicious rainstorm that occurs soon after Okonkwo brings his family to Mbanta, his mother’s homeland, in exile: “At last the rain came. It was sudden and tremendous. [. . . ] And then came the clap of thunder. It was an angry, metallic and thirsty clap, unlike the deep and liquid rumbling of the rainy season” (Achebe 130). It can be argued that the angry, sudden thunder symbolizes Okonkwo’s hasty return to Mbanta. His fiery, spontaneous nature resembles the thunderstorm.
Foil Characters
Finally, foil characters, or those that serve as opposites to one another, are also used to accentuate Okonkwo’s angry nature. In Things Fall Apart, Obierka and Okonkwo are foil characters. Obierka represents wisdom and reflection; he “was a man who thought about things” (Achebe 125). Okonkwo, on the other end of the spectrum, represents rash and thoughtless reaction, which is often sparked by his feelings of anger. Obierka, an elder in the clan, warns Okonkwo not to join the other clansmen to take Ikemefuma out in the jungle; in the end, Okonkwo attends and is actually the one to kill Ikemefuma, for fear of appearing weak to the other men. Again, the only emotion Okonkwo is comfortable revealing is anger.
Students sometimes feel that studying literary elements in the context of a novel is laborious, even pointless. You can counteract this attitude by focusing their attention on a common thread that links the elements together. In addition, you can show students the interplay that exists among literary elements and how they work together to achieve a common purpose; in this case, they help reveal the motives of the main character in Things Fall Apart.
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. New York: Anchor Books, 1959.
