Theme of Colonialism in Reference to “Things Fall Apart”

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Name: Ranjan P. Velari

Class: M.A. Sem. 4

Paper No: 14 (The African Literature)

Enrollment No: 14101032

Email Id: ranjanvelari@gmail.com

Topic: Theme of Colonialism in Reference to “Things Fall Apart”

Guidance: Heenaba Zala

Submitted to: Smt.S.B. Gardi

                         Department of English

                         Maharajakrishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University

Theme of Colonialism in Reference to “Things Fall Apart”

Introduction of the Novel:

Things Fall Apart was first published in 1958.Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe portrays a stunning moment in African history- the imposition of colonial rule with sympathy and dignity, focusing on the complexity and integrity of pre-colonial Igbo life, and the turmoil resulting from British rule.

Chinua Achebe’s goals were modest when he began to conceive and write Things Fall Apart in the early 1950s:

‘I was quite certain that I was going to try my hand at writing, and one of the things that set me thinking was Joyce Cary’s novel set in Nigeria, Mister Johnson, which was praised so much, and it was clear to me that this was a most superficial picture… and so I thought if this was famous, then perhaps someone ought to try and look at this from the inside’ (African Writers Talking, 4).

 Achebe’s project of looking at Nigerian culture from the inside was going to move more slowly than he might have expected, however.

                                 

What is the meaning of Colonialism?

Colonialism is the establishment, exploitation, maintenance, acquisition, and expansion of colony in one territory by a political power from another territory. It is a set of unequal relationships between the colonial power and the colony and often between the colonists and the indigenous population.

How colonialism affected society?

Because of the British Raj so many people lost their identity, culture and heritage. From the very beginning African people suffers and struggled lot. That’s why they conditioned by such things and believed that they are inferior. But in this novel we can clearly see the real voice of Chinua Achebe. Sometimes it happens that native people habituated by white people and don’t think to their own way.

Reflection of Colonialism in Chinua Achebe:

Achebe grew up and came of age in the culture of colonialism. He was not only brought up in a Christian family, and thus identified with European culture; his early education was in Church schools where the influence of the Bible and biblical stories, Christian moral codes, and indeed modern civility were emphasized. In addition, Achebe’s secondary education at the prestigious government school at Umuahia could not but draw him even further into the culture of colonialism. Such schools were modeled after British public schools which meant that the values they promoted- in scholarship, sports, and conduct-were essentially English.

The connection between Achebe’s reading of the colonial novel and his decision to become a writer is fundamental to our understanding of the cultural function of Things Fall Apart: ‘I suddenly saw that these books had to be read in a different light. Reading Heart of Darkness, for instance… I realized that I was one of those savages jumping up and down on the beach. Once that kind of enlightenment comes to you, you realize that someone has to write a different story’.

Theme of Colonialism in Things Fall Apart:

Ø Central theme of the novel is colonialism. Through Okonkwo’s character we come to know about colonialism. Okonkwo’s cultural community and his own sense of moral order, when the institutions he had fought so hard to sustain collapse in the face of European colonialism.

Ø In retracing his rise and fall, we are also made aware of the collective dimension of his tragedy: Okonkwo may have failed because of his weaknesses as an individual, but his failure was inevitable because colonial rule had destabilized the values and institutions that sustained him.

Ø Indeed, there is a close relationship in the novel between Okonkwo’s individual crisis- of authority and power- and the crisis of his community, which increasingly finds its defining characteristics (including notions of wealth, marriage, worship, language, and history), undermined and transplanted by the new colonial order. These issues are so powerful in the novel that attentive readers will rarely miss them.

Ø Similarly, the period in which Achebe conceived and wrote Things Fall Apart was also a time of anxiety and crisis. By 1952 it had become apparent that the period of colonial rule in Nigeria was entering its final phase: after almost a hundred years of foreign domination, a period of which the culture of the country was entering a period of self-government.

Ø And because this historical shift was a sudden as the initial imposition of colonial rule, critical questions arose: What was to be the nature of the Nigerian nation after colonialism? What kind of persons had colonial culture created? What was the language of the desired postcolonial culture? And, ultimately, how was the history and destiny of this new community to be charted?

Ø The theme of the novel relies on how the battle of tradition versus modernization takes place in the form of the culture of Okonkwo’s clan and the teachings of the English colonizers. European colonialism is something which has totally destroyed the culture and traditions of the group of people which in turn into destroyed their identity. Colonialism is new knowledge on ‘true’ faith and eradicating unlawful customs, the nature of forcing the Christian faith and towards people who are reluctant to accept they can also be judged as an unlawful act.

Ø Although Things Fall Apart may appear to be exclusively concerned with the imposition of colonial rule and the traumatic encounter between African and Europe, it is also a work that seeks to address the crisis of culture generated by the collapse of colonial rule. Indeed, Achebe has constantly argued that the theme of colonial domination in Africa- its rise and influence- was made imperative in his works by his concern that the culture of colonialism had had such a strong hold on African peoples, especially on a psychological level, that its consequences could continue to haunt African society long after European colonizers had left the continent.

Ø In one of his most influential statements on the role of the novelist in Africa, Achebe observed that, although decolonization had changed the African cultural landscape, it was foolish to pretend that Africans had ‘fully recovered from the traumatic effects of our first confrontation with Europe’.

Ø Achebe went on to argue that his role as a writer was ‘to help my society regain belief in itself and put away the complexes of the years of denigration and self-abasement’. In a situation in which colonial rule had established its authority by inventing and insisting on the racial inferiority of the African, novels set in the past, such as Things Fall Apart, were retrospective attempts to understand the origins of the current crisis- ‘to look back and try and find out what went wrong, where the rain began to beat us’.

Ø Clearly, the crisis of the soul triggered by colonialism at the end of Things Fall Apart, when Okonkwo is forced to his death and his heroic life is reduced to a single paragraph in a racist European text, was very much an issue in 1958. However, unlike many other African writers of his generation, Achebe did not see colonial rule as something that could be transcended simply by an appeal to a heroic and African past. And where other writers could see the culture of colonialism as the antithesis of an African identity, Achebe was interested in discovering a redemptive moment in colonialism, asking himself, in his own words, ‘what possibility, what encouragement, there was in this episode of our history for the celebration of our own world, for the singing of the song of ourselves, in the din of an insistent world and song of others’.

How Things Fall Apart presented Colonial experience? 

        

Ø Achebe’s novel presents the colonial experience from an African perspective, but it does so without romanticizing the African past. Thus, one of the most enduring aspects of Things Fall Apart is Achebe’s ambiguous representation of the Igbo past as heroic but, at the same time, compromised by Okonkwo’s blind commitment to his culture and his obliviousness to alternative values and interpretations. This is the meaning of what is probably the definitive moment in the novel- the killing of Ikemefuna.

Ø Okonkwo strikes the fatal blow against his adopted son in the name of tradition and the moral order of his friend Obierika, although the oracle of the hills (the custodian of moral authority) had decreed that the boy must be killed, she had not ordered Okonkwo, the surrogate father, to carry out the sentence. This one disturbing episode encapsulates the very essence of Achebe’s philosophy, especially his concern with moral complexities and dualities. As he told Bill Moyers in a famous television interview, his values as a novelist are guided by a powerful Igbo proverb-‘Wherever something stands, something else will stand beside it’. Culture is, in other words, defined by ambivalence rather than unquestioned authority.

Ø If Things Fall Apart appears to be a novel that sets out to provide important moral lessons to its readers, it is because Achebe conceives the primary function- and power- of literature to be moral or ethical in nature. The power of the storyteller, says Achebe, lies in his or her ability to appeal to the mind and to reach beyond his or her particular circumstance and thus speak to different periods and generations; the good storyteller is not bound by narrow political or personal concerns or even by the demands of specific historical moments. Achebe’s sympathies then are not with the heroic character, but the witness and storyteller who refuse to endorse Okonkwo’s commitment to the central doctrines of his culture or the European colonizer’s arrogant use of power.

·       Conclusion:

Colonialism affected people and has managed to pull them apart in many directions that it even eventually destroyed relationships of families, friends and tribes. Narrative can mostly be seen as the life of a single member in an African tribe, but if we see it in bigger perspective the book presents collective situation and life of the African people at the same time wherein outside forces are trying to change the traditional practices of the people.

 Works Cited

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Johannesburg, South Africa: William Heinemann, 1958.

http://criminology-articles.blogspot.in/2012/09/colonialism-in-things-fall-apart.html.