The Significance Of The Ibo Culture In Things Fall Apart

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world” (W.B Yeats, “The Second Coming”). This quote is the epigraph in Chinua Achebe 's book “Things Fall Apart”. The second half of his book you start to see the Ibo culture falling apart which could be the result of a few different things. W.B Yeats once said that things do not collapse on their own but that their must be outside pressures as well as internal conflict. I think that this is why Achebe chose this quote. He chose it to show us how in his book the Ibo already had problems which worsened once the Christians arrived. In this quote “the widening gyre” is mentioned which I believe …show more content…
This shows us how the Ibo culture could fall apart because of its own internal problems but the line “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world” (I think) tells us that they did not fall apart by themselves. For there to be anarchy in the world there needs to be multiple factor which for the Ibo would be the Christians. With these two sides: the Ibo fell apart because of their own rituals and beliefs leaving some people doubting their culture caution things to fall apart, or the Christians speed up the process that was already going on it is taught to decide which is it especially when there is one more reason the Ibo could have fallen apart. Some could argue that the Ibo were fine before the Christians came and it was all their …show more content…
You can see this in Nwoye. “Nwoye had heard that twins were put in earthenware pots and thrown away in the forest, but he had never yet come across them. A vague chill descended on him and his head had seemed to swell, like a solitary walker at night who passes an evil spirit on the way then something had given way inside him. It descended on him again, this feeling, when his father walked in, that night after killing Ikemefuna.” Nwoye was one of the few people who actually questioned the customs of the Ibo. Even before the Christians arrived he was uncomfortable with the deadly customs his father and the rest of the Ibo people practiced. “like a solitary walker” it is talking about someone who walks alone at night and this is when it is the easiest for the evil spirits to get to them. In Nwoye’s case the evil spirits that are getting to him are his realizations about the culture. “something had given inside of him.” This is very important because this is telling us that this was the moment something changed inside of him. It was his turning point where he finally realized all the horrible thing that were happening in his culture. Someone else who thought like this was Obierika. Obierika was a man who thought about things like why he had to throw out his children, “what crime had