Okonkwo's Identity

Okonkwo’s Down Fall

“No matter how prosperous a man is if he was unable to rule his women and children then he is not really a man”. Okonkwo’s sense of identity was challenged with the introduction of western ideas into the Ibo culture. Okonkwo started out in the novel as a wealthy and respected warrior of the Umuofia clan, a lower Nigerian tribe that is part of a consortium of nine connected villages. But the cultural collision of the British colonists and Ibo people affected Okonkwo to the point of his depression, downfall, and eventually death. The reason for Okonkwo’s change in their sense of identity included the killing of Ikemefuna, when Okonkwo accidentally killed Ogbuefi Ezeudu’s sixteen-year-old son, and when he killed their leader with his machete. When the crowd allows the other messengers to escape, Okonkwo …show more content…
(p) The first reason Okonkwo’s sense of identity was challenged with the introduction of western ideas was because of the death of Ikemefuna caused Okonkwo into sink into a depression neither able to sleep nor eat. We see evidence in the text when the narrator declares that “Okonkwo did not taste any food for two days after the death of Ikemefuna. He drank palm-wine from morning till night, and his eyes were red and fierce like the eyes of a rat when it was caught by the tail and dashed against the floor”.(p.44)This evidence supports my claim because Okonkwo goes threw a depression stage which brings him to the start of his downfall. The second reason Okonkwo’s sense of identity was challenged with the introduction of western ideas was because when he killed Ogbuefi Ezeudus son he was banished from the tribe because when you kill another member from your tribe, its a crime against the earth god. We see evidence from the text when the writer states “The only course open to Okonkwo was to flee from the clan. It was a crime against the earth goddess to kill a clansman, and