Things Fall Apart.- First Impressions.

Things Fall Apart- Chinua Achebe

My first impression of Okonkwo (personality, attributes and faults). 

  

Chinua Achebe was a Nigerian novelist who was highly admired by many other authors and readers because of his most famous novel, Things Fall Apart, where he includes different cultural aspects from the African society and literature. In this novel, Achebe achieves to create a different perspective about the African environment and also includes aspects such as the interaction between the africans as human beings, their beliefs and traditions. 

So far, the book has been about the everyday experiences of a man called Okonkwo whose life is a mere example of the African culture and beliefs.

Okonkwo has shown to be a strict man due to his good reputation in the community and because he is one of the most admired men in the village. He learned to be strong and brave because he hated the way he father was. His father was a very lazy man and everybody in the village disliked him because he wasn't productive in comparison with other men. Therefore, Okonkwo started to think that any men who didn't fight or participated in battles, wasn't men at all and he was also afraid to become like his father. This can be one explanation of his personality and behavior towards other people. 

Okonkwo's most important attribute is that because of his strong personality, he is capable to control his three wives, and he decides how he wants to raise his children. On the other hand, one of the biggest faults of Okonkwo is that sometimes he gets to be so rude that he hurts people without noticing it. He even hurts himself because he keeps all his feelings and emotions inside and do not express them, in other words, he keeps the guilt provoked by his actions inside himself and he can be seen by as a careless man. 

In conclusion, it is important to highlight that the African culture and beliefs are certainly exemplified in the novel, for example, the fact that despite Okonkwo showed to be brave, rude and mean, in the inside, he really cared about the others but the reason why he didn't express his feelings was because he wanted to prove to everyone that he was strong enough to be the "leader" and a good example of a "real man".