Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (Book Analysis): Detailed Summary, Analysis and Reading Guide
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This engaging summary presents an analysis of Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, which centres on the great warrior and champion wrestler Okonkwo as he deals with the challenges resulting from disagreements in his clan, the arrival of white missionaries in his village and the mounting tension between tradition and modernity. The engaging narrative provides a compelling, immersive portrait of Igbo life in Achebe’s native Nigeria and a thoughtful exploration of the impact of colonialism and of themes such as masculinity, honour, pride and disobedience. Chinua Achebe was a Nigerian writer who sought to use his novels, short stories, essays and poetry to examine the struggles facing his country and expand popular conceptions of Africa and its people. He is widely considered to be the founding father of modern African literature.
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• Character studies
• Key themes and symbols
• Questions for further reflection
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Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (Book Analysis) - Bright Summaries
NIGERIAN AUTHOR
Born in Ogidi (Nigeria) in 1930.
Died in Boston in 2013.
Literary awards:
St. Louis Literary Award, 1999
Man Booker International Prize, 2007
Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, 2011
Notable works:
Things Fall Apart (1958), novel
No Longer at Ease (1960), novel
Arrow of God (1964), novel
Home and Exile (2000), essays
Chinua Achebe was born in Ogidi, Nigeria, one of the first towns in the country to be visited by Anglican missionaries. His parents had converted to the Church Mission Society, a Protestant denomination, but continued to respect their ancestors’ traditions.
Achebe’s gift for reading and writing in English earned him entry to the prestigious Government College in Umuhaia, which was modelled on English public schools and funded by the colonial administration, and had been set up to educate Nigeria’s future elite. It was a very academically demanding school, and students were only allowed to talk to each other in English, the language of their colonisers.
In 1948, he was awarded a bursary to study medicine at University College in Ibadan, but during his time there he developed an interest in literature and became increasingly critical of the ways Africa and its people were depicted in European fiction. After reading Mister Johnson by Joyce Cary, in which all the Nigerian characters were portrayed as either savages or buffoons, Achebe was so disgusted that he decided to abandon his medical studies and become a writer in order to prevent such glaring cultural ignorance and change people’s perceptions of Africa.
After graduating, he began writing his first novel, which was a major challenge because very few African works of fiction had previously been published in English.