i
TITLE PAGE
A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF ACHEBE’S THINGS FALL APARTAND NWANA’S OMENUKO
BY
IDOKO, FLORENCE NGOZIKAPG/MA/07/42924
A PROJECT REPORT SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OFTHE REQUIREMENT FOR THE AWARD OF MASTER
OF ARTS (M.A) DEGREE IN THE DEPARTMENT OFLINGUISTICS, IGBO AND OTHER NIGERIAN LANGUAGES (WRITTEN LITERATURE STRESS)
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA, NSUKKA
MAY, 2009
ii.
APPROVAL PAGE
This project has been approved on behalf of the
Department of Linguistics, Igbo and Other Nigerian
Languages, University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
_________________________ ______________________________Prof. Inno. Uzoma Nwadike Dr. B.M. Mba
Supervisor Head, Department of Linguistics,
Igbo & Other Nigerian Languages
_____________________External Examiner
iii.
DEDICATION
TO
My Husband, Alex
ivACKNOWLEDGEMENT
My special thanks goes to the Almighty God,
who in His infinite mercy, made it possible for
me to start this programme, strengthened me all
through and above all, brought the programme to a
successful end.
To produce this work, I have had much
encouragement and help from various persons. Most
prominent among them is Professor Inno. Uzoma
Nwadike (KSM), my supervisor, who untiringly
directed me with great patience and tolerance.
Prof., you are a father indeed. My unreserved
gratitude goes to my husband, Chief Alex C.
Idoko, who has sacrificed ALL in his life, human
and material, to keep me moving forward. Daddy,
may God bless you in a special way. My special
thanks and appreciation goes to Chief J.M.U. &
Dr. (Mrs.) Oby Omeje (KSM) whose love and
encouragement has inspired me throughout the
course of my study. I wish to express my
indebtedness to my children, Ifeanyi and Chidera,
whose love and encouragement continued to give me
strength all through the period. My sincere
regards also goes to my foster son, Hon. F.C.
Ozioko, for his moral and financial support.
I owe a great debt of gratitude to the Head,
Department of Linguistics, Igbo and Other
Nigerian Languages, Dr. B.M. Mba, and all the
Lecturers in the Department for the quality
lectures we received from
v.
them which has gone a long way in giving this
work its present appearance of perfection.
I am very grateful to all the teachers of
Modern Primary School, Ezzi Iheakpu-Awka, for
their encouragement and support. I am looking
forward to seeing you join me in the academic
pursuit. I wish to appreciate here, the advice
and encouragement of my mother, my late father,
“Comparative Analysis of Achebe’s Things Fall
Apart and Nwana’s Omenuko” is a critical study of
the relationship between the two classical novels
in the areas of setting, theme, character and
characterization.
Both Achebe and Nwana use the same pattern of
settings. Two categories of setting are
identifiable in both Things Fall Apart and Omenuko:-
a pre-colonial society, free from any external
influence and fully democratic: and, a society
dominated by European values.
The theme of Omenuko is offence and
expiation while that of Things Fall Apart is the
disintegration of the traditional society
resulting from the influence of the colonial
religion and government. The authors also use
other powerful sub-themes to bring home their
stories. Such sub-themes include love, manliness
and survival, colonization, sojourn and return.
The authors thus succeeded in showing us the
social changes in the traditional Igbo society
brought about by colonization.
These authors present protagonists that rise
from a humble beginning. Their lives are ruled by
the same passion – to become successful, powerful
and rich. In the case of Achebe’s hero, the very
gods
vii.
whom Okonkwo strives to obey and serve drives him
out of his fatherland because of the inadvertent
killing of a clansman; just when he is ready to
acquire the highest title in the land, marry his
daughters off to deserving suitors and initiate
his sons into their first manhood groups. Okonkwo
goes into exile in his maternal home, Mbanta. All
the sins he commits are against the Earth
goddess: the killing of the son of Ogbuefi Ezeudu
and the final abomination of taking his own life.
On the other hand, Nwana’s hero sells his
clansmen into slavery for his own selfish
interest. He goes into exile in Ndi Mgborogwu.
Omenuko is made to suffer remorse for his crime,
then appeases the gods, his land and people. Like
the prodigal son, he realizes the enormity of his
sin and goes home penitent. He is reconciled with
his people and there is general jubilation.
Through the novelist’s method of
characterization, one is able to gain insight
into a great variety of human behaviour and
problems.
viii.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::i.
APPROVAL PAGE ::::::::::::::::::::::::ii
DEDICATION ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ::::::::::::::::::::iv
ABSTRACT ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS::::::::::::::::::::
viii
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION ::::::::::::::::::::1
1.1 Background of the Study ::::::::::::1
1.2 Significance of the Study ::::::::::::1
1.3 Background of the Authors ::::::::::::2
1.4 The Novels and their Backgrounds::::::::5
1.5 Scheme of Organization ::::::::::::7
1.6 Methodology ::::::::::::::::::::81.7 Analysis of Data ::::::::::::::::
::::9
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW::::::::::::::::10
CHAPER THREE
RELATIONSHIP OF THINGS FALL APART ANDOMENUKO: SETTING, THEME, CHARACTER
AND CHARACTERIZATION ::::::::::::20
Setting ::::::::::::::::::::::::20Theme ::::::::::::::::::::::::28Character and Characterization
::::::::33
ix.
CHAPTER FOUR
SOCIAL PROBLEMS ::::::::::::::::::::39
CHAPTER FIVE
CONCLUSION ::::::::::::::::::::::::51
BIBLIOGRAPHY ::::::::::::::::::::54
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the study
The purpose of this study is to examine
the response of African Novelists to the social
instability which necessarily came in the wake
of colonialism. I have selected Things Fall Apart
and Omenuko, by Chinua Achebe and Pita Nwana
respectively because both novels are in one way
or the other concerned with societies in
transition.
Transition is used in the context of this
essay to define the historical period and
phenomenon of a society in an ambivalent
conflict between two radically different
cultures. For the society depicted in Achebe’s
novel, transition involves a change from
independence within a traditional, self
regulating order to subordination to an
imperial Britain. Historically, this
phenomenon occurred in the first two decades
in the nineteenth century. For Nwana’s
society, transition involves a change from the
Igbo political system to the complete control
of Igboland by the British colonial
administration. This change also comes in the
first decade of the nineteenth century.
1.2 Significance of the study
The reason why I selected Things Fall
Apart and Omenuko is that a comparative study
will help me to evaluate the two novels in
order to establish their respective literary
merits. Secondly, it will enable me to
highlight the similarities and differences
between these two works, although the authors
share a common colonial experience. I will be
able to demonstrate the contributions –
national and individual – made by each author
to the central tradition of the novel.
My method will be essentially analogical.
This means the investigation of similar
settings, themes, character and
characterization between the two works under
study.
1.3 Background of the Authors
Things Fall Apart and Omenuko are separated
only by space, not by age. In a way, they
belong to the same generation following the
similarities of their cultural background and
the periods of their stories.
Achebe hails from Ogidi in Anambra State of
Nigeria. He had his secondary school education
at the Government College, Umuahia, and later
went to the University Collge, Ibadan, where he
intended to read Medicine, but became attracted
to literature. His literary studies included
the major classical and modern authors and
essayists. Distorted presentation of Africa by
some writers like Joseph Conrad, Graham Green
and Joyce Carry generated in him the desire to
“set the records straight” and to paint an
African portrait of Mister Johnson:
I know around ‘51’, ‘52’, I was quite certain that I was going to try my hand at writing, and one ofthe things that set me thinking was Joyce Carry’snovels set in Nigeria, Mr. Johnson, which waspraised so much, and it was clear to me that it wasa most superficial picture of not only of the country – but even of the Nigerian character, andso I thought, if this was famous, then perhaps someone ought to try and look at things from the
inside.
Achebe worked with the Nigerian
Broadcasting Service, where he came in contact
with the whitemen whose patronizing attitude
he depicted in some of his novels.
Taken together, Achebe’s five novels
encompass the entire socio-historical
experience of Nigeria from pre-colonial times
to the present. His first novel, Things Fall Apart
(1958), deals with the impact of tribal life
by the Western ethos. The novel is set partly
in the pre-colonial days and partly at the
moment of contact of Igbo culture with Western
culture. Achebe recreates and interprets for
his people their past before the coming of the
British. His second novel, No Longer At Ease,
(1960), is set partly in Lagos and partly in
the village of Umuofia. The novel is about the
temptations that confront a young Nigerian
with a Western education, when he is given
responsibility in his own country. Its drama
is the oppressive demands made on the
individual in a transitional society, or
settling society in which old values are
crumbling under the pressures of new ones. In
his third novel, Arrow of God (1964), Achebe
returns to the theme of the conflicts of
western and Igbo traditional world views. A
Man of the people, (1966), the author’s fourth
novel, is set in the city and deals with
politics. The abuses that the novel describes
show the problems of imposing an alien socio-
political system on collection of different
ethnic groups each of which has its own
peculiar socio-political culture. Anthills of The
Savannah (1988) his fifth novel, is where the
issue that exercises thought is the exercise
of power.
Apart from novels, Achebe has written
short stories: the Sacrificial Egg and other Stories,
(1962); Girls At War, (1972). His children’s
stories include, Chike and the River, (1966), How
the Leopard Got His Claws, (1972). There are, in
addition, collections of poems and essays:
Beware Soul Brother and other Poems, (1971). Morning
Yet on Creation Day, (1975), is a collection of his
essays, on a variety of subjects: literature,
literary criticism, language, war, personal
travels and Igbo cosmology.
On a very wide contrast, not much is known
about the author of Omenuko. Like Chinua
Achebe, Pita Nwana was not an Igbo scholar. In
the 33rd Inaugural Lecture of the University of
Nigeria, Nsukka, Professor Inno Uzoma Nwadike
states thus:
He was a foreman at the Uzuakoli Institute.He
only attained Sunday School education at theCMS on the Niger at Onitsha. Mr. Pita Nwanatrained as a carpenter.
He published no further books. According to
Erenest Emenyonu in The Rise of the Igbo Novel
(1978), “He seems, therefore, to have been the
reporter of the pioneer generation of Igbo
literature and not its creative genius”.
However, Omenuko is very special in the sense
that the author, Mr. Pita Nwana is the first
Igbo to write fiction in Igbo. His novel,
Omenuko, was published in 1933 after it had
won an all-African literary contest in
indigenous languages organized by the
International Institute of African Languages
and Culture. It is a biographical novel based
on the actual events in the life of the hero,
Igwegbe Odum.
1.4 The Novels and their Backgrounds
Pita Nwana’s Omenuko and Achebe’s Things Fall
Apart, deal with transitional periods when two
different colonial societies are trying to move
from a settled way of life to a new unknown one.
Achebe’s Things Fall Apart describes a society’s
response to contact with a colonizing cultural
force. The traumatic impact of this force on
indigenous culture becomes the background against
which Achebe exposes the harmful effects of the
period on the minds and lives of the indigenes.
This is a starting point in the evaluation of the
social problems of Things Fall Apart.
In the case of Nwana’s Omenuko, the impact
the contact with a colonizing cultural force had
on the indigenes was even more devastating.
Before the era of the colonial administration,
there was a kind of autonomy in Igbo behaviour.
Individuals were free to act as they chose to as
long as they did not break popular village
sanctions or mores. If they did, they were not in
danger of the whiteman’s retribution but the
judgment of the elders in their local villages.
But with the changing times and the point of
transition highlighted in the novel, everybody is
now accountable to the courts of law and the
whiteman.
As mentioned earlier, Achebe and Nwana share a
common culture derived from colonial experience –
an experience which left an indelible mark on the
psyche of the Africans. It involves the imposition
of new political, economic and religious cultures
on the colonized. More importantly, the imposition
of political control also involves conscious or
unconscious deviation of the people’s culture and
distortion of their past. In Africa, loss of
political freedom was attended by loss of cultural
confidence. The work of European anthropologists,
who placed the African culture at the bottom and
the European at the top of cultural evolution,
undermined, to a large extent, the Africa’s
confidence in himself, making him accept the
European-created image of him as primitive.
The colonizers, however, persuaded themselves
that they were on a humane and philanthropic
mission of civilizing and Christianizing of the
‘primitive’ and ‘benighted’ natives. Colonialism,
however, produced a
counter movement or cultural nationalism which
functioned to inspire artists. From the 1930s to
the 1960s, educated West Africans attempted to
revive authentic West African values. Obiechina
rightly points out that:
Like similar movements in Latin America,Ireland and dependent states of nineteenthcentury Europe, African cultural nationalismtook the form of the rehabilitation of the oldcultural tradition and its values, including are-awakening of interest in the folklore, arts,music and cultural habits of the local peoplewhich most distinguished them from the metropolitan culture.
The African learned to take pride in his
values which he had but almost lost due to
colonial denigration. The myth of the African
inferiority was gradually eroding. Obiechina’s
comments are particularly relevant to Achebe, in
whose novels one notes a sustained attempt to
express and affirm his people’s past.
1.5 Scheme of Organization
For easier analysis, this essay is divided
into five chapters. While the first chapter
introduces the work, the second chapter reviews
the existing literatures. The third chapter
illustrates the relationship between literary
vehicles in Things Fall Apart and Omenuko in the
areas of setting, theme, character and
characterization. The fourth chapter deals with
the social problems highlighted in the two
novels under study. These factors are
essentially destabilizing agents which make the
period a transitional one, and hence their
relevance to the theme of this essay.
1.6
Methodology
In this study, data were obtained through
two major sources namely, primary and secondary
sources.
(a) Primary sources
(1) The novels under study: Things Fall Apart
and Omenuko.
(2) Visits were made to the National
Archives where relevant
materials were obtained and
utilized.
(3) Oral interviews were held with
knowledgeable artists in the
area of literature. Literary critics and
comparatists were also consulted.
(4) Through personal observations: The
researcher equipped herself
with first-hand knowledge of certain
aspects of the study. Being a scholar of
oral and written literature, a teacher of
Igbo Literature and a literary critic, she
is so to say, an insider.
(b) Secondary Sources:
An extensive review of existing
literature was made. These include books,
dissertations, theses, journals, seminar
papers and newspaper articles.
1.7
Analysis of Data
Data collected from the variety of sources
were subjected to a very careful scrutiny and
all possible bias and subjective judgments were
neglected.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Comparative Literature means giving a
comparative approach to the study of literature.
It is the discovery of cultural relativity in
the field of literature. According to Willfried
Feuser (2001) in Essays in Comparative African Literature,
The main direction of comparative scholarship inNigeria should, therefore, be inward. Genre studyand thematology could, for example, be appliedto selected “ethnic” literatures viewed both in their traditional art forms and their adaptationsof imported, western models like the novel.
Nigerian literature in whatever form of
linguistic expression relates to the literatures
of other African countries and to the other
continents. Comparative analysis is therefore
very necessary to measure relativity. For
instance, the concept of ‘ogbanje’, as mentioned
in Things Fall Apart are used by Yoruba as ‘Abiku’,
by Edos as ‘orinmin’, by the Housas as
‘damwabi’, and by the Ghanaian Fanti as
‘kossamah’. Moreover, the concept of ‘chi’ in
Igbo corresponds to ‘ori’ in Yoruba. Quoting
Feuser (2001) in the same essay,
You cannot read a single page of Fafunwa, Tutuolaor Amaku without stumbling over some archetype
or other, and if it is true, as Roger Bastide (p.77 in Negritude: Essays and Studies, Albert H. Berrianand Richard A. Long, eds. Hampton, Va, Hampton Institute Press, 1967) assures us that “Jung re-discovered all of Greek mythology in the sub-consciousof his Swiss patients”, then so much the better for theuniversality of African thought and imagery.
Apart from literature, other fields of
human endeavour also enter the orbit of
comparative literature if we are to adopt its
definition by Henry H.H. Remak (1961) which
posits that:
Comparative literature is the study of literature beyond the confines of one particular country, and the study of the relationship between literature on the one hand and other areas of knowledge and belief, such as the arts … philosophy, history, the social sciences, the sciences, religion, etc. on the other. In brief, it is the comparison of one literature with another or others, and the comparison of literature with other spheres of human expression.
National Literatures are not islands unto
themselves. There are bound to be border
violations between the various national domains.
Those are beneficial in the sense of a greater
intellectual and aesthetic openness and an
enhanced possibility of mutual understanding.
With reference to the texts under
review namely, Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and Nwana’s
Omenuko, a lot of references were made as it
concerns comparative literature. Commenting on
the heroes of Chinua Achebe and Thomas Hardy,
David Carroll observes in Critical Perspective on Chinua
Achebe,
As Okonkwo’s life moves quickly to its tragic end,one is
reminded forcibly of another impressive butwrongheaded
hero, Henchard in The Mayor of Casterbridge.They share in obsessive need for success andstatus, they subordinate all their private relations tothis end, and both have an inability to understandthe tolerant, skeptical societies in which their novelsingle mindedness succeeds … Viewed in theperspective of the Wessex, rustic way of life,Henchard is crass, brutal, and dangerous; but whenthis way of life as a whole is threatened withimminent
destruction, then his fierce resistance takes on acertain
grandeur. The reader’s sympathy describes asimilar
trajectory as it follows Okonkwo’s career. By thevalues
of Umuofia, his inadequacies are very apparent; butwhen the alien religion begins to question and
underminethese values, Okonkwo, untroubled by the heart-searching of the community, springs to its defense
and acts. (Chinua Achebe 62 – 63).
In comparison of the character of the heroes
of Achebe and Hardy,
Eustace Palmer, in An Introduction to the
African Novel (1981), states thus:
Things Fall Apart is a novel of character and environment but in a slightly different sense thanthe novels of Hardy. In Hardy’s novels a character’sdestiny depends on social circumstances. But in Achebe’s
case, environment is character. Okonkwo is what his society made him, for his most conspicuous qualities are
aresponse to the demands of his society: if he is plagued byfear of failure and of weakness, it is because his societyputs such a premium on success; if he is obsessed with
status
it is because his society is preoccupied with rank andprestige;
if he is always itching to demonstrate his prowess in war,it is
because his society reveres bravery and courage, andmeasures success by the number of human heads a manhas won; if heis contemptuous of weaker men it is because his societyhas conditioned him into despising cowards. Okonkwois the personification of his society’s values and isdetermined to succeed in this rat race.
Early reviews of Things Fall Apart tended
to stress the simplicity
of its narrative plots, themes and
anthropological details. But later critics have
shown that the apparent simplicity of the novel
is deceptive as there are complex and subtle
interplay of values and attitudes artistically
embedded in the work. Such complexity has been,
in fact, identified and analyzed by various
critics. Solomon O. Iyasere, talking about the
complexity of themes of Things Fall Apart, write in
Critical Perspectives on Chinua Achebe (1979), where
he states:
Things Fall Apart seems a simple novel, but it isdeceptively so. On closer inspection, we see that It is provocatively complex, interweaving significant themes: love,compassion, colonialism, achievement, honor, andindividualism.
As recorded in the Breast of the Earth, Kofi
Awoonor (1975), contributing on the theme of
Things Fall Apart asserts that on the question of
theme, Achebe’s preoccupation is to recreate
out of the despised history of Africa the story
of its dignity and integrity:
African people did not hear of culture for the first timefrom Europeans; their societies were not mindless but frequently had a philosophy of great depth and value and beauty, they had poetry and, above all, they had dignity. It is this dignity that many African people all but lost during the colonial period and it is this they must regain.
Consequently, Things Fall Apart is a novel
which attempts to recapture Igbo traditional
life in its unpolluted state. The author
recreates a settled past when the people
enjoyed a tranquil life without contrasts with
the instability brought about by British
colonialism.
Ejikeme Alua (1976), writing on the theme
of Omenuko, records his own contribution in an
article in the Journal of the Igbo Studies Association,
Volume 2, titled Odenigbo. According to him:
The contemporary view is that Pita Nwana has, may be inadvertently, explored two themes in thebook. Basing their argument on what the authorstated in his preface, one school of thoughtholds that the book is woven round the conceptand acknowledged philosophy of the African that astranger must always feel the urge to go home nomatter his achievements in his place of sojournoutside his home. The reason for this is that eventswhich regulate his life in another land must invariablyremind him that he is a stranger who is not wanted by his hosts. Instances are then cited from the book to support this view.
As a critic, I do not agree with this
school of thought. That a stranger should
always feel the urge to go home is a philosophy
in different parts of the world. Such a
philosophy must not be regarded as a theme. It
is the punishment of the sin he committed that
led him to sojourn to Mgborogwu. What disturbed
Omenuko at Mgborogwu much was not the urge to
go home but the urgency of cleansing himself
from the sin he committed. He had started
getting worried even before the first secret
meeting of the people of Mgborogwu against him.
Omenuko needed peace of mind and got something
close to that as soon as he retrieved the
people he sold and offered sacrifices for the
sins he committed and not when he finally
returned.
The other school of thought holds that the
theme of the work is “sin and its expiation”.
This concept was just muted by Ernest Emenyonu
in his article in Research in African Literature,
Volume 4, number 1 (1973). Those who support
this view also advance evidences from the work.
Ejikeme Alua also gave detailed expositions
to settle this academic tussle by weighing the
views expressed by the two parties on the basis
of the facts emerging from the work. A close
observation of the detailed discussion on the
issue reveals that he tried to convince the
reader to arrive at an acceptable conclusion as
he comments:
In conclusion, it is evident that “Sin and expiation”is the theme of the book. It was sin that sent Omenuko out of his home and caused him the emotional disturbances and other awful experiences abroad; it was the expiation and adequate restitutionfor the sin that brought him back home. It puts a stopto the emotional booby-traps which had bedeviledOmenuko since after his crime. Ejikeme Alua (1976).
The setting of Omenuko is discussed
extensively by Ernest Emenyonu in The Rise of Igbo
Novel (page 33). The setting is important to the
actions in the novel as it helps to bring out
the conflict in which the hero is trapped. He
writes:
Omenuko is set in Okigwi, one of the densely populatedareas in Imo State. The action takes place in the rural communities around busy market places,where commercial activities go side by side with serious matters, such as settling disputes and planningcommunity projects. The market is more than a meeting place for local affairs. People drink palm wine,pour libations, as haggling and bargaining go on over their agricultural product. Families live within walled
compoundswhere the head of the family supervises his immediate
andextended families from his obi.
For the setting of Achebe’s Things Fall Apart,
Innes (1986: p.47)
writes:
Each of Achebe’s novels shed light on a different era inthe recent history of Nigeria. Things Fall Apart(1958) is set in a traditional Ibo village community at the
turn of the century when the first European missionariesand administrative officers were beginning to penetrateinland.
Many other works of different literary
artists have been compared to prove certain
similarities among different cultures.
Kofi Awoonor (1975: p.225) who compares
Achebe and Tutuola as artists observes:
Achebe is a more conscious artist than Tutuola. Hispreoccupation with creating an “authentic” African
voiceis more deliberate and studied than Tutuola’s
felicitous accidents of language. If Tutuola’s work is described
whollyfrom the African tradition, Achebe is the direct
articulateproduct of the European presence in Africa.
In their comparative study, Ernest N.
Emenyonu and Benaiah E.C. Oguzie (1958)
tried to compare the poor relationship that
exist between the foreigners and their
hosts. According to them:
We also see the lack of social interaction between the foreigners (the whiteman, the court messengers and theinterpreter) and the people. There was complete lack oftrust between the two groups. The whiteman was said tobe ignorant and did not speak the native language and sowas unable to understand or learn the culture of the people.The messengers were ridiculed as well. The special
prejudice is clearly seen in the song by the prisoners:
Kotma of the ash buttoksHe is fit to be a slaveThe whiteman had no senseHe is fit to be a slave(Things Fall Apart, Chap. 20, pg. 123)
This attitude of the ‘new Africans’ is
also shown in other works by African
writers which goes to confirm that the
issues which Chinua Achebe wrote about in
Things Falls Apart were not peculiar to Igbo
people alone. They were also common to
other parts of Africa. In his Song of Lawino
Okot P. Bitek from Uganda showed how Lawino
pleaded with her husband, Ocol, not to cast
away the ways of his ancestors in favour of
a new culture. She pleads:
… Listen Ocol, my old friend
The ways of your ancestors
Are good
Their customs are solid
And not hollow
They are not thin, not easily breakable
They cannot be blown away
By winds
Because their roots reach deep into the soil
(Okot P’Bitek, Song of Lawino, pg. 29)
The same people writing about the views of
arts from Kenya in reference to the whiteman’s
presence, quote Ngugi Wa Thiong’os from Kenya,
in his Weep Not Child (Heinemann 1964) who
shows the whiteman’s presence in Africa also as
unwelcome to the people when he said: “We made
the roads and cleared the forest to make it
possible for the warring whiteman to move more
quickly”.
Talking about the concept of the
Hero in The Rise of the Igbo Novels, Ernest
Emenyonu (1978: p.157) compares:
It is interesting to compare Achebe’s concept of the hero tothat of Pita Nwana in Omenuko. Both novels have
historicalperspectives and deal with the same people although
they are set a generation or two apart from each other. In
both novels success is the aspiration of every member of the society and achievement is greatly applauded and
honoured.Both novelists show how the pursuit of success can lead
to a cunning wrestling with the forces of nature, causing alopsided development of the individual, which, in turn,ultimately, affects his society. In both novels popularexpectations produce tragic consequences in the lives of
theheroes. The Rise of the Igbo Novel (1978: P.57).
In summary literatures reviewed show
that comparative studies had existed long
ago. This means that a lot have been
compared; ranging from literary artists to
works in other fields of study. Studies
indicate that there are relativity among
cultures, themes, concepts, ideas, etc. as
well as differences. Many concepts found
in one culture surprisingly exist in other
cultures within a country and even beyond.
The study further indicates that
comparative study units have been
established in different universities
across the country. This goes to show that
there is even interdisciplinary comparison.
The literatures reviewed also show that the
novels Things Fall Apart and Omenuko have been studied and
compared by various critics over the years.
In the next chapter, we shall look at the
relationship between Things Fall Apart and Omenuko in
the areas of setting, theme, character and
characterization.
CHAPTER THREE
RELATIONSHIP OF THINGS FALL APART ANDOMENUKO: SETTING, THEME, CHARACTER
AND CHARACTERIZATION
The choice of an adequate literary form
for a story is of the most crucial choices
confronting any novelist who wishes to make a
faithful representation of life. The form of a
novel is as important as its content, and
indeed, constitutes the organizational
principle which renders the content
significant. In this chapter, therefore, the
intention is to analyze the similarities and
differences in Things Fall Apart and Omenuko based
on the following elements of literature –
setting, theme, character and characterization.
SETTING:
A close observation of Things Fall Apart and
Omenuko shows that their setting effectively
promotes the themes of transition. In these
texts, both authors deal with characters who
live in a native environment and culture. Both
Achebe and Nwana have adopted a similar pattern
in setting because both authors are concerned
with the theme of transition.
Two major categories of setting are
identifiable in both Things Fall Apart and Omenuko: a
pre-colonial society and a society dominated by
European values.
(1) Place of Setting:
Omenuko is set in Igboland in well
known places. All the towns mentioned are
familiar and still exist up till today. For
example, Mgborogwu where most of the events
take place is Mkpologwu in present day
Aguata Local Governsment Area of Anambra
State. Emenyonu (1978:34) is of the views
that:
Omenuko is set in Okigwi, one of the denselypopulated areas in Imo State. The action takes place in the rural communities around busy marketplaces where commercial activities go side by sidewith serious matters such as settling disputes andplanning community projects.
Other towns mentioned where Omenuko plassed
or stayed for the purpose of trading such as
Umuduru Nso Ofo (presently Umuduru, near
Arondizuogu); Umulolo, Bende, Ozuakoli and Ezi
Nnachi, are all familiar places in Abia and Imo
States and Awka, where Omenuko received his
warrant of office is the present Awka, capital
of Anambra State. In Things Fall Apart, the
events that take place occur equally in
Igboland specifically in Umuofia and Mbanta
(unknown places). Most of the activities
depicting family life take place in the various
compounds while others such as wrestling
competitions and clan meetings take place in
the village playground (Ilo). According to
Wren (1980;1) “Things Fall Apart is set in the land
where the author was born, raised and
educated”. He adds that “the land lies east of
the great Niger River and north of the Niger
Delta”.
(ii) Time of Setting
Both stories in Omenuko and Things Fall Apart
took place very many years ago when the Igbo
people were still stark illiterates and when
whitemen with their religion and colonial
government had just made their appearance. In
Things Fall Apart, for example, the whiteman’s
very existence and physical appearance still
belong to the realms of rumour and grim
humour. This emerges clearly in the discussion
of variation in customs during the marriage of
Obierika’s daughter. Obierika compares the
rumour of whiteman’s existence to “the story
of whitemen who, they say, are white like this
piece of chalk … and these whitemen, they say
have no toes” ( chapter 8, pp. 51 – 52). At
this point, no one from Umuofia had yet seen a
whiteman. Machi humorously associates white
with a local word for leprosy (“the white
skin”). This joke is to prove prophetic
eventually, for when the whiteman eventually
appears, he proves as destructive to the old
order as leprosy is to the skin. It could be
safely assumed that the events reported in
both novels took place when Christianity was
just appearing on the horizon because ritual
murder, killing of twins and slave trade were
still being practiced. At this point, Igbo
customs had not been tainted to a large extent
by European civilization and influence. About
Omenuko, Emenyonu (1978: 34) affirms:
The novel is set in the last few decades of thenineteenth
century, but the most important actions take place inthe
first two decades of the twentieth century. Omenuko issaid to have returned to his hometown (at the end of
thenovel) in 1918.
(iii) Social Setting:
The story of Things Fall Apart starts when
the Igbo society is unsoiled and virtually free
from any external influence. The political
structure is clearly defined and everybody is
subject to the law of the land and impartially
treated. Democracy at its best is practiced. On
this, Wren (1980:) has this to say:
Within the clan the political organization is democratic.There are no chiefs or kings … important decisions aremade by the clan assembled as a body … while majorinternal conflicts are dealt with by the ancestral egwugwu …Thus no one person has authority much in excess of hisfellows:
The overall picture is that of a peace loving
clan where nobody is unduly oppressed. At the
bottom of the social ladder, the osu (outcast)
would be found. These are people dedicated to the
gods of the land and who are not allowed the
freedom to enjoy the rights and privileges of the
free-born.
However, towards the end of the novel (from
chapter fifteen), there is a marked erosion of
this political structure by the colonial
authority.
Wren (1980:3) writes that:
The stability of the order among the eastern Igbowas profoundly shaken by the coming of the Europeancolonial power. The checks and balances which the communities had evolved over the centuries were rendered useless when the district commissioners –British political officers laid down the law withoutunderstanding the tradition and custom.
In Omenuko, the political life of the people
is more or less organized in the same manner as
in Things Fall Apart with everybody including men and
women, elders and priests participating in the
art of governance. (Emenyonu (1973:35) says that
The affairs of the village are decided by a generalassembly in which men and women can participate.However, effective control is in the hands of theelders, members of an age set whose turn it is, togovern the village at a particular period in their age grade circle.
Again, as in the case of Things Fall Apart, after
the first few chapters, European colonial
administration is ushered in with native courts,
warrant chiefs, court clerks and court messengers
and interpreters actively participating in
dispensing law and justice and maintaining order.
For instance, it is the white district
commissioner that issued the warrant of office to
Omenuko at the death of Eze Mgborogwu on behalf
of young Obiefula, the son and heir of Eze
Mgborogwu. It is the same District Commissioner
(Nwa D.C) that warned the people of Orumba na
Isii of the dire consequences of attacking
Omenuko and his people at Ikpa Oyi.
Religiously, the Igbo people at the early
beginning of Things Fall Apart are idol worshipers
although they have an unshakable belief in God
Almighty called Chukwu (Great God) or Chineke
(The Creator). The other deities which they
worship include Ani (the earth goddess),
Amadioha (god of thunder), Agbala, Idemili and
Ogwugwu. Prayers, libations and sacrifices are
consistently and carefully offered to these
gods, goddesses and ancestors through the
mouthpeace of the deities – the diviner, priests
and priestesses. Ezeani is the priest of the
earth goddess, Ani, while Chielo is the
priestess of Agbala. To a great extent, the life
of the individuals in the community and indeed
the life of the community is controlled by these
deities through their pronouncements and
sanctions. There is complete obedience to their
laws and commandments. Wren (1980: 2) notes that
“morality is enforced by the priest of the earth
goddess and the oracle of the Hills and caves
provides advice to individuals and guidance to
the clan”.
However, towards the later part of the story
(Chapter 16) Christian missionaries of blacks
led by a few white men started to make inroads
into the traditional religion and life of the
Igbo people. The people are told of All
Powerful God and His son Jesus Christ (who God
had without a wife) and that whoever worships
this God through His Son, the Christ, will go to
heaven. They are informed, to their chagrin and
bewilderment,
that the deities they worshiped are pieces of
wood and stone and are ineffective and impotent
and that persistent worship of these deities
will send them to hell fire that burns with
unquenchable fire. These two opposing teachings
led to very serious clashes between the clan and
the Christians backed by colonial power and
authority which finally led to the break-up of
the Igbo society.
Similarly, the Igbo community represented in
Omenuko worships the God Almighty (Obasi Di
n’Elu) and various other deities. These deities
wield enormous power and influence on the life
of the community and their commandments are
scrupulously obeyed. Hence, when Omenuko
committed an abomination against the gods and
the people of his land, he is punished by going
into exile and by being made to offer a very
costly propitiatory sacrifice to appease the
gods and the people. On the above, Emenyonu
(1978: 37) asserts:
Because of the enormity of his crime and his recalcitrant behaviour, Omenuko is required to
offer a sacrifice of atonement in the highest termsever prescribed by the chief priests of the twoangered deities. In the process, he learns self-discipline and comes to appreciate the true valuesof his society …
The two angered deities in question are
represented by Aniche and Iyiukwu. However,
later in the work, mention is made of Omenuko’s
children going to school without reference to
the influence of the missionaries as is the case
in Things Fall Apart.
The economic life of the Igbo people in
Omenuko revolves around farming and trading
although emphasis is placed on trading as
against Things Fall Apart where emphasis is placed on
farming. Unfortunately, at that period, slave
trade was still being practiced without
interference from the colonial masters. That is
why Omenuko is able to sell some of the young
men who are helping him in his business when he
loses all his goods in a river mishap. However,
by Igbo standards, Omenuko is respected for his
astuteness in life generally and in business in
particular. Due to the uncanny handling of his
business, he becomes extremely wealthy while in
exile in Mgborogwu. He was one of the richest
people in his clan on his return to his native
land.
In Things Fall Apart, economic activity of the
Igbo people revolves around farming; the main
crop being yam. The other crops planted by the
women are cassava and cocoyam. Apart from
farming, there is palm wine tapping by the men.
There is also local markets where goods are sold
with the aid of cowries. Later, with the coming
of the church which brings new form of worship
and education, there is trading in palm oil and
palm kernel. Again educated Igbo people serve as
court clerks and teachers. Life is such that
everybody struggles for himself to make both
ends meet and to carve out a name for himself,
economic prosperity being one of the hallmarks
of a great man and a great family.
THEME
The theme of Omenuko, according to Emenyonu
(1978: 34) is offence and expiation. It is a
story of the abomination committed by the
protagonist, Omenuko, and how he finally appeased
the gods of the land to enable him live in amity
with both the gods and the people of his land.
To Wren (1980: 45), the central theme in
Things Fall Apart is the disintegration of traditional
society resulting from the influence of the
colonial religion and government. The entire
story revolves around how the culture and
traditions of the Igbo society crumbled due to
the influence of the colonial masters ably backed
by their government.
Apart from these central themes, Chinua
Achebe and Pita Nwana brings out many sub-themes
in their texts – Things Fall Apart and Omenuko
respectively. These sub-themes include:
(i) Love
Achebe’s hero, Okonkwo, allows his buried
humanity to express itself only in private
unguarded moments. Publicly, especially among the
members of his own clan, he struggles to maintain
the image of an unusually calm and stalwart
individual, a man worthy to be a lord of the
clan. It is only in private, and often in the
dark, that Okonkwo spontaneously reveals the love
and warmth he feels for his family. In the dark,
he rushes to protect his daughter from harm by
Chielo; without thought, he rushes to save her
from iba. He had wished Ezinne had become a boy.
Okonkwo also loves Ikemefuna. It is the
closeness of this father-son relationship, being
expressed in the feasting of the locusts, that
Ezeudu interrupts to tell Okonkwo that Ikemefuna
must die. At the very moment of his violence
against Ikemefuna, we see love locked inside. “As
the man who had cleared his throat drew up and
raised his matchet, Okonkwo looked away”. Okonkwo
looked away not because he is a coward, not
because, like his father, he could not stand the
sight of blood; after all; “in Umuofia’s latest
war, he was the first to bring home a human head,
his fifth”. Okonkwo looks away because of his
buried love for Ikemefuna whom he has taken as
his own son.
Omenuko’s expression of love on the other
hand is outward. He loves his brothers and
confines in them when he was in trouble. He also
took their advice to run out of their homeland
after the sin he committed. Even the boys he sold
into slavery he felt for them and made sure that
he brings most of them back.
(ii) Manliness and survival
In Things Fall Apart, the thematic emphasis on
manliness and survival, becomes extended through
the yam, the “king of crops”, a “man’s crop”.
Okonkwo’s effort to assert himself through
success as a yam father is firmly based in an
ontology that insists on man’s masculine role as
the provider of support for the family.
Contrasted with this and illustrating the
society’s insistence on manly virtues is the
picture created of Okonkwo’s father, Unoka, a man
known “in all the clan for the weakness” of his
matchet and hoe. Okonkwo visits Nwakibie, an
elder, in order to borrow yam seedlings for his
new farm:
“I have come to you for help”, he said. “Perhaps you can already guess what it is. I have cleared a farm buthave no yams to sow. I know what it is to ask a manto trust another with his yams especially these dayswhen young men are afraid of hard work. I am notafraid of hard work. The lizard that jumped from the high iroko tree to the ground said he would praisehimself if no one else did. I began to fend for myselfat an early age when most people still sucked their mother’s breast. If you give me some yam seeds, Ishall not fail you”.
Moreover, Okonkwo’s desire to assert his
manliness is clearly dramatized in the killing of
Ikemefuna. The obsession with proving and preserving
his manliness dominates Okonkwo’s entire life, with
public and private: “He rules his household with a
heavy hand. His wives, especially the youngest, live
in perpetual fear of his fiery temper, and so do his
little children” (Things Fall Apart, Chapter 2, p.9).
Even in the informal relaxed story-telling sessions,
Okonkwo sees as threat to himself and his dynasty,
the boys sitting with their mothers, “for these
stories will make women of his sons, make them like
their grandfather rather than like their father”. So,
at those times, “Okonkwo encourages them to sit with
him in his obi and he tells them stories of the land-
masculine stories of violence and bloodshed”.
The hero of Pita Nwana, Omenuko, shows his own
manliness through his actions no matter the
consequences. His ambition to rise above his humble
beginnings seems to have produced an extreme reaction
in his character. Being a trader, profit becomes his
guide in most of his major actions in the novel;
humanness becomes a consideration only later when he
can afford it. Consequently, he is always on top of
things, scheming and grasping, the cool man and the
easy talking operator. Only few of the people he
meets recognize him truly for what he is, not even
the ‘white District ’Commissioner.
(iii) Colonization
Achebe, in Things Fall Apart, tries to show the
impact and the attendant consequences of the
colonial system on the Igbo traditional system.
Pita Nwana has also done that twenty years before
Achebe. The difference here would lie on the
different ways in which the different authors
mould their chief characters. While Okonkwo in
Things Fall Apart is more pronounced and more
uncompromising in his reaction to the changing
society, Omenuko is not only silent and non-
committing in his reaction, but he also tries to
utilize this new change to his own advantage.
Pita Nwana sees through his chief character that
the whiteman’s colonization is not what one can
fight against, but something one has to accept and
exploit to one’s own good. Pita Nwana, however,
is not as articulate as Achebe in showing
the social reaction and conflict generated by this
colonial system in Igbo society. It is natural to
expect that the two cultures could not have had such
a peaceful and uneventful fusion as Nwana presents
it. Achebe’s hero, Okonkwo, is very articulate in his
contempt of and opposition against the new culture.
Omenuko, on the other hand, is silent and
uncommitted in this war between the two cultures. He
does not believe in fighting or dying for any of the
systems. He would rather exploit to his advantage,
anything good he finds in any of the systems.
(iv) Sojourn and Return:
The chief characters, in Things Fall Apart and
Omenuko, have been made to undergo the same
fate with near identical consequences. Omenuko
as well as Okonkwo committed crimes and as a
result, both of them are made to go into exile
as punishment for their crimes. In the case of
Okonkwo, it is exile for a stipulated number of
years (for seven years), while in the case of
Omenuko, the number of years in exile is not
stipulated; it could go on for life. The
reasons are that while Okonkwo’s crime is non-
premeditated or accidental, Omenuko’s crime was
a premeditated one.
In the traditional Igbo society, almost
all crimes are atoned for. This usually is in
the form of sacrifice to be done by the
offender. Before Omenuko could go back to his
home town he had to offer some sacrifices to
atone for his crime. Nwana and Achebe record
that their heroes returned home as wealthy men.
Both came back to meet a changed society in
which the powers and innovations of the
whiteman have been firmly entrenched. After
considering the circumstances surrounding their
sojourn and return, Omenuko voluntarily retires
from public life while Okonkwo retires from
life itself.
CHARACTER AND CHARACTERIZATION
There are few similarities in the
characters mentioned in both Omenuko and Things
Fall Apart. First, only two characters are
outstanding in both works. In Things Fall Apart,
they are Okonkwo and his great friend,
Obierika; Okonkwo being the protagonist. In
Omenuko, it is the hero of the story, and again
his great friend, Igwe. This is not to say that
nothing can be said about other characters in
Things Fall Apart such as Uchendu, Nwoye, Mr. Brown
and Ezinne or about such characters in Omenuko
like Nwa D.C., Mazi Oji and Nwabueze.
Secondly, the two protagonists in the two
novels start life from a humble beginning. They
later grow very rich. Each committed an
abomination which led to their exile. Both
became wealthy again during their exile, from
where they now came back home.
Both Okonkwo and Omenuko are strong-
willed, ambitious and industrious and both are
determined to achieve greatness and fame. Both
are highly respected in their communities such
that Okonkwo is chosen as the imperial emissary
to Mbano and is given the custody of Ikemefuna
on behalf of his clan while Omenuko is so
respected and trusted that many parents entrust
their children to his care for their welfare
and progress in life. Also, Omenuko, a
stranger, is mandated to hold the warrant of
office of Eze Mgborogwu on behalf of his young
son, Obiefula.
The above notwithstanding, there are many
differences in the character of both Okonkwo
and Omenuko. Okonkwo is a hot tempered man who
strongly believes that might is right and the
only thing worth demonstrating is strength,
anger and brutality. He is a man of violence
who relishes in inflicting injury to others. In
anger, he soundly beats his wife, Ojiugo,
forgetting that it is during the week of peace.
In anger, he beats his second wife, Ekwefi,
just for cutting off few banana leaves and not
only that, he actually fires at her with his
dane gun when he heard her murmuring against
him. It is the constant nagging, bullying and
beating which his first son, Nwoye, receives
from him that makes him feel disenchanted with
life and with his father which eventually leads
him into the beckoning hands of the Church. On
the other hand, Omenuko is of cool temperance.
In fact, throughout his life time, there is no
act of violence he exhibited within his family.
He is always level-headed and strongly believes
in using his considerable wisdom in solving his
problems.
Okonkwo had an inflexible will and once he
starts something, he would neither budge nor stop
to reflect, but would go all out to fulfill his
wishes no matter the consequences. For instance,
after their humiliating imprisonment, he swears
revenge when they were eventually released. “If
they listen to him (Egonwanne), I shall leave
them and plan my own revenge”, he swore (Chapter
24). This, he fulfilled by butchering the head
messenger sent by the District Commissioner to
stop their clan meeting. This is an attribute of
a flat character. On the other hand, Omenuko is a
very flexible person and able to adapt to varying
conditions and situations. He always considers
his actions very carefully before doing anything.
For instance, when Ndi Mgborogwu start harassing
him by insisting that he should hand over the
warrant of office back to Obiefula, instead of
adamantly refusing, he accepts. After he
trickishly secures his own, he hands over
Obiefula’s own to him.
Okonkwo is an autocratic father who rules
his family with an iron fist. He takes decisions
unilaterally. He does not believe in consultations,
always believing that he is right in his decisions.
For instance, despite the warning he receives from
Ogbuefi Ezeudu not to participate in the killing of
Ikemefuna, he refuses and he is the very person who
kills the poor boy. He refuses to agree with his
wife, Ekwefi, that two goats would be enough for the
farewell feast for his mother’s kinsmen. He always
has contrary views on issues with his great friend,
Obierika. On the other hand, Omenuko is a democrat
to the core. He believes in persistent consultations
and out rightly seeks for advice and also accepts
suggestions from his people and abides by them. For
instance, after the sale of his kinsmen into
slavery, Omenuko calls a meeting of his family
members where he tells them of his heinous act and
of the mayhem he is envisaging. During the subdued
meeting, he is dissuaded from carrying out his evil
intention which he readily accepted. At the death of
Eze Mgborogwu, he called the elders of Mgborogwu
together to deliberate on how to meet the District
Commission at Awka. He always consults his great
friend, Igwe, on any important decision he wants to
take.
When the only course open to Achebe’s hero
was to go into exile, he fled to Mbanta, his
mother’s kinsmen. There, he was received, supported
and consoled. Achebe writes about the assurance of
protection given to Okonkwo by his mother’s younger
brother, Uchendu.
It’s true that a child belongs to its father. But whena father beats his child, it seeks sympathy in hismother’s hut. A man belongs to his fatherland whenthings are good and life is sweet. But when there issorrow and bitterness, he finds refuge in hismotherland. Your mother is there to protect you.She is buried there. And that is why we say that Mother is supreme. (Things Fall Apart Chapt. 14p.94).
In contrast to Pita Nwana’s hero, when
Omenuko fled his hometown, he did not seek
refuge among the kinsmen of his mother’s maiden
family, instead, he fled to Mgborogwu, where he
was without patrilineage and therefore without
citizenship either in the world of men or in the
domain of his ancestors. The people of Mgborogwu
seized upon this when they rose against him for
seeking to hold the highest office in their
land. They protest to the white District
Commissioner, “we shall never allow this to
happen in this our own land, that one who is,
afterall, a stranger should be our head and
chief executive”.
Okonkwo of Things Fall Apart, started preparing
for his return as soon as he entered his last
year in exile. Irrespective of the kindness
showed to him by his mother’s kinsmen, he
regretted everyday of his exile. He says, “The
seven wasted and weary years were at last
dragging to a close”. He is very happy as he
prepares to go.
Omenuko on the other hand, tries various
devices to prevent his return. He tries
exaggerated acts of charity, as well as other
diplomatic maneuvers but these only serve as
temporary tolerance. The evidence that Omenuko
is not happy going home is that he became very
willing only when the District Commissioner sees
the threat to his life and advises him to return
to his original homeland to avoid being
assassinated by his angry landlords.
In the heroes’ characterization, while
Okonkwo’s name hase nothing in relation to his
actions in the novel, Omenuko’s name shows his
actions in the novel. He gives out actually even
in the face of scarcity.
CHAPTER FOUR
SOCIAL PROBLEMS
In Things Fall Apart and Omenuko, the authors
tried to highlight many of the social problems
of the time. Some of these social problems still
rear their ugly heads in the present day society
while some are either carried out secretly in a
different way or not done at all. In this
chapter, effort will be made to look at the
striking social problems as contained in the two
novels to see their relatedness or otherwise.
They include
(i) Slave Trade:
In Pita Nwana’s novel, Omenuko, it is clear
that slave trade was practiced at that time,
though not openly. A merchant by profession,
when the novel opens, he had lost all his goods
on his way to the market following the collapse
of a rickety bridge. With amazing rapidity,
Omenuko sells his neighbours’ sons and relatives
who were apprenticed to him into slavery for the
sake of his own economic survival. Omenuko
arranges and sells those boys secretly in the
middle of the night, hence committing a criminal
act against his society. In the author’s own
words, we read:
N’ime abali ahu ha ruru Bende, o wee jekwurundi enyi ahia ya, ndi nke na-agba ya mmadu,si ha, “Bianu ugbu a n’abali, m jiri ihe ahia bia.”(Omenuko Isi mbu, p.6).
(In the night they arrive Bende, he (Omenuko)
went to his customers that buy slaves from him
and said, “come this night, I came with some
articles of trade”).
The author, however, disapproves and
severely condemns this practice of slave trade.
This we can see through the critical reactions
and condemnation which Omenuko receives on his
return from Bende where he sold his boys into
slavery. Even his brothers were not exempted in
the condemnation. When he initially solicits the
support of his brothers, they responded with
serious reproach.
His brothers told him that it (the selling of hisapprentices) is a thing unheard of and can neverplease the ear that hears it … They blamed himfor his rash act, because it is an event which can never be forgotten in life. They wondered how he could summon up courage to sell the childrenof his fellow men merely because his goods fellinto a river. “Was it the fault of your fellow manthat you lost your goods? (Emenyonu, 1978 p.39).
In the same way, Chinua Achebe makes us
notice the existence of slavery in Things Fall Apart.
He calls it ‘low born and outcasts’ (the slaves
and the osu). The traditional society of that
time excludes this group of people from
communicating socially, politically and
religiously with the free-born. When the free-
born who joined the church started mixing freely
with the outcasts who formed the bulk of the
congregation in those days, it was seen by the
elders as an abomination and they lamented that
“the church had come and led many astray. Not
only the lowly born and the outcast but
sometimes a worthy man had joined it”. A worthy
man here refers to the free-born of the village
and titled men as shown by Ogbuefi Ugonna, who
being a titled man and well respected in the
village, “had cut the anklet of his titles and
cast it away to join the Christians”. In trying
to convince the missionary why the outcasts
should not be allowed into the church, one of
the converts says,
He was a person dedicated to a god, a thing setapart – a taboo for ever, and his children after him.He could neither marry nor be married by the free-born. He was in fact an outcast, living in a specialarea of the village, close to the general shrine.Wherever he went he carried with him the mark
of his forbidden castle – long, tangled and dirtyhair. A razor was a taboo to him. (Things Fall Apart,Chapter 18, p.111).
The author, however, shows his disapproval of
the osu practice in the way the missionary
responds to the speech of the converts.
In our society today, we cannot say that
the practice of slavery is completely wiped out.
Where it is practiced however, it is done with
utmost secrecy and sometimes given another name,
for instance, when we listen to the media most
of the time, we hear government battling with
how to stop human trafficking and child labour.
(ii) Murder:
Chinua Achebe records many cases of murder
in Things Fall Apart as opposed to Pita Nwana who
records only one case of murder in Omenuko. In
Things Fall Apart, the wife of Ogbuefi Udo went
to the market at Mbano and had been killed. No
reason was given for her murder. In a gathering
of Umuofia people in the market square, Ogbuefi
Ezeugo had said through a gleaming white teeth,
“Those sons of wild animals have dared to murder
a daughter of Umuofia”. The woman was the wife
of Ogbuefi Udo.
During the second year of Okonkwo’s exile,
his friend, Obierika, visits him. In their
discussion, Obierika tells him the events that
had taken place in his absence. One of such
events is another case of murder as recorded by
the author. “Have you heard, asked Obierika,
‘that Abame is no more?”. Obierika narrated to
his friend how the first whiteman was seen in
Abame and on consultation with the Oracle, they
were told that the strange man would break their
clan and spread destruction among them;
And so they killed the whiteman and tied his iron horseto their sacred tree because it looked as if it would runaway to call the man’s friends. I forgot to tell you another thing which the Oracle said. It said that otherwhitemen were on their way. They were locusts, it said, and that first man was their harbinger sent toexplore the terrain. And so they killed him (ThingsFall Apart, Ch. 15, pp 97 – 98).
Continuing his story, Okonkwo’s friend,
Obierika, told him that on a market day, when the
market was full, the whitemen and their followers
surrounded the market and began to shoot.
According to the story, “Everybody was killed,
except the old and the sick who were at home and a
handful of men and women whose chi were wide awake
and brought them out of that market”.
Furthermore, at the gathering of the clan of
Umuofia, after they have ransomed the six elders
detained by the British Administration to plan
their next line of action, the District
Commissioner send his hated messengers to break up
the meeting. “Okonkwo confronts the head
messenger, trembling with hate and unable to utter
a word”. Achebe creates a powerful scene as he
writes,
In a flash Okonkwo drew his matchet. The messengercrouched to avoid the blow. It was useless. Okonkwo’smatchet descended twice and the man’s head laybeside his uniformed body. (Things Fall ApartCh. 24, p.144).
In comparison with Omenuko, Pita Nwana did
not record any intentional murder in his novel.
This second social problem of murder is still
present in the society of today as assassins are
hired to kill people who are regarded as enemies.
(iii) Wars:
There are cases of wars recorded by the two
authors in review. Pita Nwana records that when
the people of Mgborogwu could not force Omenuko to
leave their home for them, they met and decided
to carry war to his house at Ikpa Oyi. During
this fight, two people; one from each side, were
killed. However, Chinua Achebe did not present
wars physically but in many occasions talked about
wars. For instance, when the sons of Mbaino
killed the daughter of Umuofia, Okonkwo was sent
to Mbaino as “the proud and imperious emissary of
war”. The people of Mbaino, however, out of fear
for the war-like people of Umuofia, opted for a
peaceful settlement by giving them a lad of
fifteen and a young virgin. We also hear stories
of wars in different parts of the world today.
(iv) Accidental Killing
During the funeral ceremony of a warrior,
Ogbuefi Ezeudu, Achebe, records Okonkwo’s
activities as well as other people’s activities to
give the great man a befitting burial. In his
words,
The drums and the dancing began again and reachedfever-heat. Darkness was around the corner, and the burial was near. Guns fired the last salute and the cannon rent the sky. And then from the centre of thedelirious fury came a cry of agony and shouts ofhorror. It was as if a spell has been cast. All wassilent. In the centre of the crowd a boy lay in a poolof blood. It was the dead man’s sixteen-year-old son,who with his brothers and half brothers had beendancing the traditional farewell to their father.Okonkwo’s gun had exploded and a piece of ironhad pierced the boy’s heart.
There is no record of such action in Nwana’sOmenuko.
It is a social problem as many people carry
guns in different ceremonies today either as a
way of respect, as in funeral ceremonies or as
show off in other parties.
(v) Bribery and Corruption
The social problem of bribery and corruption
is shown in the texts
under discussion – Things Fall Apart and Omenuko.
In Things Fall Apart, it is clear that
bribery and corruption is in vogue that time.
It is shown in the text where the court
messenger and interpreters take bribe in a land
dispute and decide the case in favour of the
wrong side. This act of bribery spread fast as
is shown in the speed with which the court
messenger demand a bribe for the release of the
elders who were detained by the whiteman. In
the same way, Pita Nwana also records a case of
bribery when Okoroafo and other men were
traveling to Aru Ulo to see Mazi Oji for a
discussion on how to get back the slaves sold
to him. When Okoroafo and his men got to
Ozuitem, they were caught by the people saying
that they have violated their ‘Ekpe’. In the
course of the argument, the people of Ozuitem
collected five shillings each from the four men
traveling with Okoroafo.
This case of bribery is present everywhere
these days - in the court, on the road, even in
offices. Government has, however, tried to
introduce many programmes to combat the issue of
bribery and corruption such as War Against
Indiscipline (WAI), Independent Corrupt
Practices and other related Offences Commission
(ICPC) etc. It is hoped that very soon it will
be a thing of the past. Even land dispute which
rear its head has also claimed many lives in our
society today.
(vi) Violence Against Women
In Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe records many
cases of violent acts exhibited by his hero,
Okonkwo. During the Week of Peace, Okonkwo’s
wife goes to plait her hair without either
cooking the afternoon meal or making adequate
arrangement for her children’s feeding. In the
words of Achebe, “Okonkwo was provoked to a
justifiable anger by his youngest wife, who went
to plait her hair at her friend’s house and did
not return early enough to cook the afternoon
meal”. Even though it was an abomination to beat
somebody during the Week of Peace and even
though Nwoye’s mother tried to cover her co-
wife, Okonkwo did not recognize it and Achebe
declares:
Okonkwo knew she was not speaking the truth. He walked back to his obi to wait Ojiugo’s return. And
when she returned he beat her very heavily. In his anger, he had forgotten that it was the Weak of Peace.His first two wives ran out in great alarm pleadingwith him that it was the sacred week. But Okonkwowas not the man to stop beating somebody halfwaythrough, not even for fear of a goddess. (Things FallApart Ch. 14, p. 21).
On another occasion, Okonkwo’s second wife
cuts some leaves from a banana tree and
eventually the banana tree died. The New Yam
Festival is three days away. The women and
children are enthusiastic over the feast and are
preparing for it. Okonkwo hates being idle
waiting for a feast or getting over it, instead,
he prefers working in the farm. As Achebe puts
it,
And then the storm bursts. Okonkwo, who had beenwalking about aimlessly in his compound insuppressed anger, suddenly found an outlet. “Whokilled this banana tree”? he asked. A hush fell on the compound immediately. ‘Who killed this tree?’
Or are you all deaf and dumb? (Things Fall ApartChapter 5, p.27)
Even though the woman admitted that she had
merely cut a few leaves off it to wrap some food,
Okonkwo gives her a sound beating and leaves her
and her only daughter weeping.
In contrast, Pita Nwana did not portray such
violent acts against his hero in his Omenuko.
Violence against women is an extreme
manifestation of gender inequality and ranges
from domestic abuse, female genital mutilation,
to trafficking. Some types of violence are not
observed since they happen behind closed doors
and are treated as ‘private’ family matter.
Violence is one of the numerous mechanisms by
which women are forced into subordinate positions
by the society. In Igboland, violence against
women is an everyday occurrence and sometimes
even considered ‘normal’.
(vii) Human Sacrifice:
Another social problem recorded by Achebe
in Things Fall Apart is human sacrifice. This social
evil is however not present in Nwana’s Omenuko.
Ikemefuna, along with a young virgin girl,
was given to Umuofia in place of Ogbuefi Udo’s
wife who was murdered by the people of
Abame. Ikemefuna had grown in Okonkwo’s house
along with his own children. He has become so
used to the members of the family, especially
Nwoye, that he had almost forgotten his place of
birth. Eventually, one day, Umuofia decided to
kill him. Achebe reports that the oldest man in
the quarter of Umuofia, Ogbuefi Ezeudu, had
visited Okonkwo and had said to him:
“That boy calls you father. Do not bear a hand in his death”. Okonkwo was surprised, and was about to say something when the old man continued: “Yes,Umuofia has decided to kill him. The Oracle of The Hills and the Caves have pronounced it. They will take him outside Umuofia as is the custom,and kill him there. But I want you to have nothingto do with it. He calls you father”.
And so Ikemefuna who had been thinking of
when to see his mother and three year old sister,
was sacrificed to the gods.
Though reduced to the barest minimum now
following the effort of government, the church
and the school authorities, human sacrifice is
still being practiced in different parts of our
society.
(viii) Suicide
Suicide as a social problem is highlighted by
Achebe but is not recorded by Pita Nwana.
In Things Fall Apart, after Okonkwo had killed
the chief messenger of the District Commissioner
who came to stop the great assembly of Umuofia,
he expected his people to react positively in
his support to wage war against the white
missionary. Contrary to his expectation, they
let the other messengers escape. As Achebe puts
it,
The waiting backcloth jumped into tumultuous lifeand the meeting stopped. Okonkwo stood looking at the dead man. He knew that Umuofia would not go to war. He knew because they had let the other messengers escape. They had broken intotumult instead of action. He discerned fright inthat tumult. He heard voices asking: “Why didhe do it?”. He wiped his matchet on the sand andwent away. (Things Fall Apart Ch. 24, p. 143).
Okonkwo goes and hangs himself, committing
the final act of abomination against the gods, in
particular, the earth goddess, Ani, whom suicide
is a discretion. A man who commits suicide
cannot be buried by his clansmen.
This social problem however, does not obtain
in our society these days except in extreme
frustration.
(ix) Banishment:
In the traditional Igbo society, the
enactment and the preservation of the law is the
civic responsibility of everybody. Chinua
Achebe and Pita Nwana show clearly that
everybody knows the law and has to comply
with them. In Things Fall Apart, for instance, when
Okonkwo committed a crime, Achebe writes,
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 a man who committed it must flee from the land. The crime was of two kinds, maleand female. Okonkwo had committed the femalebecause it had been inadvertent. He could return to the clan after seven years. (Things Fall ApartCh. 13, p. 87)
In the case of Omenuko, Nwana records that
his own crime is a premeditated crime. Its
own type of exile could go on for life.
Omenuko’s recovery of those he sold into slavery
made a change in terms of the number of years
he was in exile. The two authors clearly make it
clear that these crimes committed by their chief
characters must be atoned for before each could
be accepted back into the society.
In our society today, the modern judiciary
categorizes killing as either murder or
manslaughter respectively. As for going into
exile, it has ceased to exist in Igbo society.
CHAPTER FIVE
CONCLUSION
The pattern of history Achebe traces in
Things Fall Apart resembles Nwana’s vision in
Omenuko. A close examination of Things Fall Apart
and Omenuko reveals remarkable similarities in
patterns of events employed by both novelists
to reveal the nature and direction of the
transition occurring in the respective
traditional societies.
The change that takes place in Omenuko is
more subtle than the vision expounded in Achebe’s
pattern. It takes the nature of gradual
assimilation. Achebe’s pattern is symbolically
embodied in the severance of son from father,
with the son representing the new dispensation
which replaces the world of the father. Umuofia
finds itself caught up in a whirlwind of changes,
and as we move from the world of Unoka through
that of Okonkwo to the world of Christianized
Nwoye, we are dealing not only with the life of
an individual but also with the history of a
culture in transition. It is simultaneously the
unfolding of the history of Igbo culture.
It is clearly evidenced that in Things Fall
Apart and Omenuko the only terms for describing
inter-personal affinities are those like father,
mother, sister and brother. Hence, Okonkwo in
Things Fall Apart addresses Ogbuefi Nwakibie as “our
father” or “Nna anyi” (p. 15). The
employment of the term “uncle” for Okonkwo’s
mother’s brother, Uchendu, is Achebe’s modern
or European style rather than Umuofia’s. In
Omenuko, most of Omenuko’s life is spent
among relations who, though not members of his
nuclear family, still regard him as a member of
their family.
The subversion of the family institution is,
therefore, portrayed simultaneously as a major
cause as well as a major product of change. In
Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo repudiates his father,
only to be repudiated eventually by his own son,
Nwoye. The son, in effect, asserts a right to
pursue and serve his individual destiny rather
than the corporate destiny of the clan. In
Omenuko, Eze Mgborogwu directs that Omenuko
should hold his warrant for Obiefula, his young
son, till he grows up. Omenuko, through his
relationship with the District Commissioner,
secures for himself a warrant with which he rules
his large family at Ikpa Oyi.
Because the authors under study have the same
vision, they have themes and characters in
common. Both record societies in transition in
which adaptability has become necessary for
survival. In both novels, the characters are
ambitious, self-made social climber. The
similarities might be explained by saying that
both authors write out of a similar experience.
The technique of exhibiting the experience
differs in relation to each author’s vision of
life and the nature of environment.
Achebe adopts the tragic mode because of the
violent wrenching of the old by the new. The
events that surround Okonkwo’s fortune and
actions are all in keeping with the tragic
pattern of life and the tragic elements in human
nature. His character is of such monumental
magnitude that he dominates the drama of the
novel. As in all great tragedies, his death has
a tragic effect on his community. Omenuko as a
character also dominates the drama of the novel
but instead of being tragic, he always tries to
exploit to his advantages, any situation he
finds himself.
Omenuko is a biography of the life of a great
man called Igwegbe Odum while Things Fall Apart is a
fiction based on historical narratives. Both
novels are extensively used for reading for
pleasure and as textbooks for various
examinations.
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