Father And Son Relationships In Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart

Superior Essays
Oliver Vonderhaar
Williams
Honors English 10
6 October 2014
Like Father, Unlike Son
Family is significant for all people, especially at young ages. Fathers play an important role while their sons are growing up, effecting their personality and other traits.. This can be good or bad. Chinua Achebe makes this an obvious point in Things Fall Apart. Father-son relationships over three generations have the power to influence the personality traits of each son in Achebe’s writing. Unoka, Okonkwo’s father, unintentionally influences Okonkwo’s violent and hardworking personality by motivating him not to be unsuccessful and lazy like himself. In the opening pages, Achebe describes Unoka’s unproductive and idle life of not receiving a title, owing people borrowed money at all times, and his lackluster farming and why Okonkwo wouldn’t want to model himself after his
…show more content…
Unoka doesn’t provide any “personal or communal obligations” for Okonkwo, resulting in Okonkwo believing he is a failure. The fact that Unoka was just a biological feature motivates Okonkwo to be a hardworking man, father, and husband, providing personal and communal necessities rather than just being like his dad who was slothful instead of guiding his son to high magnitudes. In addition, Okonkwo’s father also influences Okonkwo to be a violent person. Achebe describes an alternative perspective of Okonkwo’s violent and evil personality that most don’t realize when he says that “Perhaps down in his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man. But his whole life was dominated by fear, the fear of failure and of weakness.” In several instances, Okonkwo hints of his fear of growing up like his weak and feminine father. Okonkwo shows this fear at times in the book such as when he “[draws] his machete and [cuts] [Ikemefuna] down” because “he [is] afraid of being thought weak” (Achebe 61). Okonkwo loves Ikemefuna as a son,

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    The backbone of any piece of writing is the type of literary conflict that revolves within it. To truly understand the inner workings of any piece, one must be familiar with the four main types of conflict: Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Society, and Man vs. Self. Many literary works include more than one of these forms of conflict, including Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. However, it can be said that Man vs. Man is the most prevalent of these forms within this work. The Man vs. Man conflict form in Things Fall Apart covers the relationship between the main character, Okonkwo, and his first son, Nwoye.…

    • 1089 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Okonkwo grew up with a fear of becoming like is father. His father was not a respected warrior, in fact, he had not earned any titles during his life. “But his whole life was dominated by fear, the fear of failure and of weakness” (2.12 Achebe). This fear would sometimes take over his mind and would control his actions. An example of this is when he killed his stepson, Ikemefuna.…

    • 1233 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The cause of Okonkwo’s fear of being feminine, lazy, and unable to provide for his family comes from his father Unoka.…

    • 218 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Okonkwo grows up to be a warrior because he lived in fear of being like his father, Unoka. Okonkwo was ever the fighter: strong, devoted, and masculine. His father, however, “was lazy and…

    • 754 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The text asserted, “And so Okonkwo was ruled by one passion – to hate everything that his father Unoka had loved” (13). He made the gender roles impact him by making sure he was not seen as a weak person, but one full of masculinity. To be seen as the best in this village that focuses on hegemonic masculinity, Okonkwo wins a battle. Achebe stated, “Okonkwo was well-known throughout the nine villages and even beyond. His fame rested on solid personal achievement.…

    • 944 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Who Is Unoka Selfish

    • 455 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Unoka can be describe as a negative person- lazy and failure, alcoholic and debtful, coward and fearful- which led him have amiss burial when he dies. With the help of Nwakibie, Okonkwo become rich in wealth and human, barns and houses, farms and yams despite all this possessions, he incipients new things.…

    • 455 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Chinua Achebe's novel, “Things Fall Apart” is a story that teaches a lesson. It is a story that takes you on a journey of the main character Okonkwo's life hardships, accomplishments, and defeat. Achebe gives the reader a front-row view and perspective of the lives and rituals of the Ibo people of Umuofia by creating a story full of imagery and symbolism to set the tone and pull you in “the drums beat and the flutes sang….Okonkwo was as slippery as a fish in water. Every muscle and every nerve stood out on their arms, on their backs, and their thighs and one almost heard them stretching to the breaking point.”…

    • 2007 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The more he achieves, the less he enjoys it because his fear of failure is always there, reminding him that he must continually prove himself to be better than his father. “And so Okonkwo [is] ruled by one passion - to hate everything that his father Unoka [loves]. One of those things [is] gentleness and another [is] idleness” (Achebe 13). Okonkwo beats his youngest wife, Ojiugo, for returning too late to make his dinner. The beating of his wife occurs during the Week of Peace, of which is unheard.…

    • 1185 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Unoka was in debt to people, and he loved to drink alcohol. He was never responsible, and didn’t take care of himself or his family. However, he was a good musician, who enjoyed playing the flute. Okonkwo was embarrassed by his father for being a weak coward, who wouldn’t fight, and he was poor, unsuccessful, and too gentle. Okonkwo wanted to be the exact opposite of his father, so he was loud,…

    • 1713 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Fortunately for the father, Okwonkwo could not beat him as he does his wife. Okwonkwo is very unsympathetic for the way he treats his family. He would go about disciplining them with his heavy hand to show them what they have done wrong, and he hated his father and every memory of him. Unoka, as a young child, loved the nature.…

    • 631 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Because of this fear Okonkwo believes that he constantly has to be powerful and strong in every aspect of his life otherwise, he would be just like his father. This belief leads to the horrible and unfair treatment of the people around him. Not only does Okonkwo treat his fellow tribe members with disrespect but, he also abuses his wives and children. So much that at one point in the passage, Okonkwo gave his wife “a sound beating and left her and her only daughter weeping” (Achebe 38) after blaming his wife for killing a banana tree. Okonkwo is too focused on not showing any emotions or weakness once exhibited by his father that he abuses his family to cover it up just like he did at that point.…

    • 950 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Father-son relationship in Things Fall Apart is based…

    • 753 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The novel Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe is a story about a strong but also weak man, Okonkwo, who’s world was turned upside down with the coming of Western religion. He experienced a tragic fall after the Western missionaries arrived. The theory of Western tragedy is that a great man falls from prosperity to disaster, and the concept of the Aristotelian model is that tragedy is an imitation of an action through pity and fear effecting the release of these emotions. The plot of Things Fall Apart and its protagonist (Okonkwo) adhere to the conventions of Western Tragedy and the tragic hero, but they also depart from the Aristotelian model. First of all, the plot of Things Fall Apart and Okonkwo comply with the customs of Western tragedy and the tragic hero.…

    • 1327 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The son of aforementioned Unoka, early in life Okonkwo was recognized as one of the most respected warriors in his culture, and Achebe notes that his success was not seen by the Ibo as luck, but because “one could say that his chi or personal god was good” (p. 27), Achebe also hints at a man possibly abusing his power using his chi, saying “But the Ibo people have a proverb that when a man says yes his chi says yes also” (p. 27). Okonkwo goes on to make decisions throughout his life that result in him falling more and more out of favor with the rest of the people in his village. These decisions usually centered around the fact that he was putting too much emphasis on being masculine and not enough on the important trait of being kind and affectionate as his culture strongly suggested he…

    • 1043 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The title of Chinua Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart suggests tragedy which the novel clearly portrays in relation to what happens to Okonkwo, the main character. Okonkwo has ongoing issues coping with his life because of his father’s past, he experiences the pain of his Igbo tribe falling apart because of government and the coming of missionaries, and he suffers with guilt over the death of the son he took in and accepted as his own. Okonkwo faces many trials and tribulations throughout his life, and much of this is due to his father. He tries hard his entire life to be totally opposite of his father. He wants to be seen as strong, but his mind oftentimes tells him that he is weak.…

    • 827 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays