Essay On Okonkwo In Things Fall Apart

Okonkwo, a character with a complex and difficult personality, from Chinua Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart, struggles to show emotions other than anger. Okonkwo, as a leader of the tribe to which he belongs, believes that showing affection is a sign of weakness. His behavior makes him struggle with his relationships with his wives and children, as he is very strict when it comes to disciplining them. However, he is not emotionless, he just refuses to let his emotions be known to the people surrounding him. The treatment towards the members of his family and expectations of discipline and obedience in his household make him an unsympathetic character for the reader, due to his difficult personality.
Okonkwo treats his family member similarly, because he expects obedience and discipline from every single
“Inwardly Okonkwo knew that the boys were still too young to understand fully the difficult art of preparing seed-yams. But he thought that one could not begin to early.” Preparing seed-yams and having a successful crop represented manliness, and Okonkwo wanted his children to start at young age, because he did not want them to be a “disgrace” just like his father had been. Okonkwo wanted his children to understand the struggle and wanted to set them on the path of success.
Of course, Okonkwo was not completely emotionless. He did possed good qualities and emotions, although inwardly. “Perhaps down in his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man. But his life was dominated by fear, fear of failure and of weakness...It was fear of himself, lest he should resemble his father.” (pg13/1). This explains the reason of his behavior. He did not show emotions in order to avoid resembling his father, however, this affected the way others characters saw him, and the way he is perceived by the