In numerous novels, authors commonly utilize folktales to connect the reader to the given cultures, allowing the reader insight into a foreign setting. Another way they are used is to educate the reader of a lesson.Even other times, they can used to foreshadow later events. Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe, is a splendid example of the use of folktales, ascribing the stories a greater meaning than what initially meets the eye. Chinua Achebe sets the novel in the foreign African village of Umuofia, where the Africans enjoy using folktales to teach their children lessons and to prove their opinions in arguments or discussions. However, Achebe utilizes these ostensibly pointless folktales to display a component of the novel’s overarching theme and to foreshadow critical plot points.
In the Umuofia village, there are two focal types of folktales: manly and womanly folktales. Folktales considered masculine are frequently correlated with war and violence, because that is what masculinity is portrayed as. Womanly folktales are utilized to teach lessons, to help people learn something, a grand contrast to the mostly senseless violence of the masculine folktales. Specifically, Achebe depicts Okonkwo as a …show more content…
Mother Kite tells her daughter to capture some food. Her daughter goes and finds a duckling; however, the duckling’s mother remained silent during the abduction of the duckling, so Mother Kite tells her daughter to return the duckling. Next, Daughter Kite captures a chick, and is allowed to kill and eat it because it’s mother had screamed and caused a fuss. This parallels the arrival of the first white men in Abame. The men in Abame killed the first white man they saw, without knowing if the enemy they were provoking was stronger than them. This seemingly superfluous mistake led to the destruction of the Abame village, save a few
In the Umuofia village, there are two focal types of folktales: manly and womanly folktales. Folktales considered masculine are frequently correlated with war and violence, because that is what masculinity is portrayed as. Womanly folktales are utilized to teach lessons, to help people learn something, a grand contrast to the mostly senseless violence of the masculine folktales. Specifically, Achebe depicts Okonkwo as a …show more content…
Mother Kite tells her daughter to capture some food. Her daughter goes and finds a duckling; however, the duckling’s mother remained silent during the abduction of the duckling, so Mother Kite tells her daughter to return the duckling. Next, Daughter Kite captures a chick, and is allowed to kill and eat it because it’s mother had screamed and caused a fuss. This parallels the arrival of the first white men in Abame. The men in Abame killed the first white man they saw, without knowing if the enemy they were provoking was stronger than them. This seemingly superfluous mistake led to the destruction of the Abame village, save a few