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    Literary Strategies - Achebe's Things Fall Apart

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    Tanvi Kapoor
    Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart breaks from the oral tradition of Nigerian literature and utilizes the European novel form to depict Igbo society from an African point of view. By incorporating Igbo words, proverbs, customs and traditions into his narrative written in English, Achebe creates a new hybrid literary form. The novel provides a detailed and nuanced portrayal of pre-colonial Igbo culture and religion to challenge the reductionist European conception of African societies as primitive and savage. Achebe aims to rewrite African history and assert that Igbo civilization was not a long period of darkness but a complex society with its own legal, social and religious structures.

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    Literary Strategies - Achebe's Things Fall Apart

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    Tanvi Kapoor
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    Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart breaks from the oral tradition of Nigerian literature and utilizes the European novel form to depict Igbo society from an African point of view. By incorporating Igbo words, proverbs, customs and traditions into his narrative written in English, Achebe creates a new hybrid literary form. The novel provides a detailed and nuanced portrayal of pre-colonial Igbo culture and religion to challenge the reductionist European conception of African societies as primitive and savage. Achebe aims to rewrite African history and assert that Igbo civilization was not a long period of darkness but a complex society with its own legal, social and religious structures.

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    Literary Strategies- Achebe's Things Fall Apart

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    Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart breaks from the oral tradition of Nigerian literature and utilizes the European novel form to depict Igbo society from an African point of view. By incorporating Igbo words, proverbs, customs and traditions into his narrative written in English, Achebe creates a new hybrid literary form. The novel provides a detailed and nuanced portrayal of pre-colonial Igbo culture and religion to challenge the reductionist European conception of African societies as primitive and savage. Achebe aims to rewrite African history and assert that Igbo civilization was not a long period of darkness but a complex society with its own legal, social and religious structures.

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    562 views5 pages

    Literary Strategies - Achebe's Things Fall Apart

    Uploaded by

    Tanvi Kapoor
    Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart breaks from the oral tradition of Nigerian literature and utilizes the European novel form to depict Igbo society from an African point of view. By incorporating Igbo words, proverbs, customs and traditions into his narrative written in English, Achebe creates a new hybrid literary form. The novel provides a detailed and nuanced portrayal of pre-colonial Igbo culture and religion to challenge the reductionist European conception of African societies as primitive and savage. Achebe aims to rewrite African history and assert that Igbo civilization was not a long period of darkness but a complex society with its own legal, social and religious structures.

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    of 5

    Literary Strategies and the use of Language in Chinua Achebe's

    Things Fall Apart.

    History: Oral tradition. It is important to firstly understand the historical


    literary backdrop of Achebe's writings.

    Nigerian literature has a long history in the oral tradition. Bade Ajuwon's
    article explains:

    Pre-literate Nigeria once enjoyed a verbal art civilization which, at its high
    point, was warmly patronized by traditional rulers and the general public. At a
    period when writing was unknown, the oral medium served the people as a
    bank for the preservation of their ancient experiences and beliefs. Although
    most Nigerians knew and could recount parts of their genealogy and local
    history, only a few oral artists had the skill and stamina required to chant the
    lengthy oral literature. The oral artists, freelancers or guild-associates,
    enjoyed reverence as "keepers of the people's ancient wisdoms and beliefs."
    These oral artists frequently entertained their audiences dramatically,
    providing relaxation and teaching moral lessons.

    In various parts of the country, novels developed around 1930. Centered


    upon fantastic, magical characters of humans and fairies, Hausa novels,
    called "non-realistic novels," were based on folktales.Igboland also saw a
    growth in the number of novelists who expressed the distaste of their people
    for the Christian missionaries.

    A major shift in literary style from fantasy to realism resulted from the
    founding of the University College of Ibadan in 1948. The calls for a new
    literary style came from scholars educated in the western tradition at the
    University. Conferences, journals, and newspapers urged the shift to realism.

    Next question to ask: What made Achebe break away from the oral
    tradition? Why did he choose the "novel" form to express his ideas
    and why did he choose English?

    1. The novel form had not been well-utilized by African literary scholars to
    depict the psychology of colonisation from the African point of view.

    How do we know this?

    At the time, novel Mister Johnson stood out as one of the few books about
    Africa. . Achebe saw the Nigerian hero as an "embarrassing nitwit," Achebe
    detected in the Irish author's descriptions of Nigerians "an undertow of
    uncharitableness ... a contagion of distaste, hatred, and mockery." Mister
    Johnson, Achebe writes, "open[ed] my eyes to the fact that my home was
    under attack and that my home was not merely a house or a town but, more
    importantly, an awakening story." That was the instigater. By Joyce
    Carey.

    Why English?

    He insiststhat he writein English not to attract a wide international audience,


    but simply because he had been educated in English. But he adds that his
    use of English was inspired by his Igbo background.

    Fanon quotes Michel Leiris, who supports Achebe's view.

    " Their (negros) intellectual growth took place almost exclusively within the
    framework of the French (in Achebe's case, it is English) language, and it
    would be artifice for them to resort to a mode of speech that they virtually
    never use now except as something learned."

    It's like questioning Amitav Ghosh as to why he writes patriotic literature in


    the colonizer's language. One way to answer this is because English is the
    langauge he finds more comfortable since he has been educated through its
    medium.

    The very title of the novel comes from "The Second Coming", which is a poem
    by Yeats, a poem that was taught in the university Achebe attended.
    Education then, was one of the reasons Achebe picked English as a means of
    expression.

    That's one way of looking at it, the author's perspective. Let's get into the
    colonized Negro's psychology when he toils to master the mother language,
    in this case it being English. Analysing Fanon's argument; he says:

    To speak a language is to take on a world, a culture. The Antilles Neegro who


    wants to be white will be whiter as he gains greater mastery of teh cultural
    tool that language is. Every colonized people, in other words, every people in
    whose soul an inferiority complex has been created by the death and burial
    of its local cultural originality- finds itself face to face with the language of teh
    civilizing nation, that is, with the culture of the mother country. The colonized
    is elevated above his jungle status in proportion to his adoption of the mother
    country's cultural standards. He becomes whiter as he renounces his
    blackness, his jungle.

    Clearly, teh adoption of English by Achebe is seen as a product of a


    psychological inferiority complex by Fanon. Further, Fanon says that "when
    the negro adopts a language different from that of a group into which he was
    borrn is evidence of a dislocation, a separation. The negro's inferiority
    complex is particularly intensified among the most educated, who must
    struggle with it unceasingly."
    Question now to ask is: Is Achebe's literature dislocated? Has a "separation"
    from the original Igbo culture occured? Fanon argues that even if in content
    and matter, teh novel rewrites African history, the use of English by Achebe is
    problematic for the reasons stated previously.

    Section 3: Achebe's new literary "form" as devisedin Things Fall


    Apart.

    Achebe has rightly been credited for developing techniques


    through which he expands, complicates, or disturbs the European novel form,
    and
    these techniques frequently can be seen as incorporations of African cultural
    practices,
    From the title through to the end of the novel, Achebe integrates and
    appropriates a mixture of traditional African and modern Western cultural
    and literary elements. Achebe writes in English, the language of the
    colonizer, but incorporates idioms, proverbs, and imagery that invoke the
    Igbo tradition and culture into his prose in order to convey the experience of
    African society under colonization and to force the reader to accept the story
    he tells on his own terms. Achebe writes:ince Igbo people did not construct a
    rigid and closely argued system of thought to explain the universe and the
    place of man in it, preferring the metaphor of myth and poetry, anyone
    seeking an insight into their world must seek it along their own way. Some of
    these ways are folk tales, proverbs, proper names, rituals, songs, and
    festivals". Achebe combines of oral narrative practiceswih novelistic devices
    and structures—, thereby creating a new "form" of the novel. it deploys a
    European genre, the English language,and the medium of print.
    Let's look at the Igbo words used:

    Agbala - woman, or man without title


    Chi - personal spirit [explain these two only}
    Egwugwu -- Foo-foo ,Harmattan, Ilo , Jigida, Obi,Ogene Osu - Ozo Uli.
    Notice that these words do not have direct counterparts in the English
    language. By retaining the dialect through the use of these words, Achebe
    manages to not only refresh his cultural identity, he also highlights and
    reveals the richness of his language to the European reader.

    Further, complex customs are also described in the novel. Practices like:
    Dry Season,Egwugwu ceremony, Engagement ceremony, Funeral ceremony,
    Evil Forest Feast of the New Year, Palm-wine tapping, Polygamy, The concept
    of Titles
    Achebe depicts a society that is highly structured and layered. the novel
    presents not onlythe portrait of an individual but also the portrait of a village,
    and indeed a wholecivilization.

    Section 5: Conclusion: Analysis of the rewrting of African history


    through narrative.

    Achebe’s declared intention is “teach [his] readers that their past—with all
    its imperfections—was not one long night of savagery from which the
    Europeans acting on
    God’s behalf delivered them” The pre-colonial history of Igboland is depicted
    in painstaking detail. Achebe shows both sides of the coin. Taking teh trope
    of gender for example, Achebe illustrates that while women have tehir own
    living space and unhappy wives can leave their husbands, wife beating is a
    common practice, feminine and weak are synonymous. Further, Igboland has
    a complex legal structure, with crimes divided into male and female, strict
    proceedings against murder of a clansman, punitive measures against those
    disturbing the week of Peace.

    However, the shortcomings of this system are also highlighted, the killing of
    Ikemefuna being the prime example. Ikemefuna is killed because of the
    actions of a few members of his community, the punishment is misdirected
    as the real killers of the woman go scotsfree. Thirdly, religion is painted as
    highly layered, with it dictating the everyday lives of the people. Igbo religion
    is well embellished with customs and lengthy ceremonies and people have an
    innate belief in its workings. The shortcomings of such a religion however are
    that ALL the fringe characters of teh novel, Nwoye and the unhappy wife for
    example, are teh first recruits of teh missionaries. How a society and culture
    treats its fringe actors helps one critique the society accurately. Clearly, Igbo
    religion does not satisfy the minority groups and this is one of the reasons
    why Cristianity was embraced.

    The European conception ofIgbo society is reductive. This is clear from teh
    ending of the novel where Okonkwo's story merits a meagre paragraph in the
    Commisioner's book:The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of thelower Niger.
    The Title of the book itself provides us with a lens in order view the European
    mndset. The use of the words "primitive" and "pacification" clearly highlights
    allusions to teh percieved "Darkness" and savagery of Africa and the self-
    imposed burdnof Europe and teh christian White man to educate and
    eliminate the savagery. Such a view is contested in the novel.

    Achebe’s novel shows us that a traditional, oral storytelling culture such as


    the
    Igbo experiences its own uncertainty about the meaning of events, and his
    satiric
    representation of Christianity reminds us that contemporary Western culture
    has its own superstitions and beliefs in higher powers. This juxtaposition of
    both European and Ibo culture helps the reader to objectively analyze Ibo
    history. Achebe is succesful in enlargening the lens through which African
    history is viewed by the Europeans. He critiques as well as apreciates both
    cultures through depiction.
    The politicization of a such a move cannot go unnoticed. Achebe strives to
    "repaint" mindsets and he does so through the medium of English, using the
    medium of print. He not only rewrites the cultural history of Africa but
    contributes to the reconstruction of its literary history also.

    Bibliography:

    Nigerian Literature: Oral and Written Traditions, Laura C.Gardner.

    An African Voice, Atlantic Unbound interview.

    Okonkwo and the Storyteller:


    Death, Accident, and Meaning in Achebe and Benjamin,Jonathan
    Greenberg

    On Color Prejudice, From Black skin, White skins : Franz Fanon.

    Text: Things Fall Apart.

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