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Life Is Never Sweet When Things Fall Apart

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Life Is Never Sweet When Things Fall Apart
Life Is Never Sweet When Things Fall Apart

Change is something that is very hard to accept. Especially when you are use to everything going your way. The story Life Is Sweet at Kumansenu, by Abioseh Nicol, is about a woman named Bola who had six children. Unfortunately, all of the six children ended up dying young. After she gave birth to her sixth child, a medicine man demanded her to break her dead son’s bones so he couldn’t come back to mock her. However, she refuses to fulfill the medicine man’s request. In Things Fall Apart, by Chincua Achebe, is about a man named Okonkwo who is a clan leader of Umuofia. He lives in fear of becoming like his father who was known for his laziness and cowardice. Throughout his life, Okonkwo attempts to be the antithesis of his father. From an early age, he builds his home and reputation as a wrestler and hard working farmer. Okonkwo’s effort largely pays off and he becomes wealthy through his crops and marries three wives. The Africans in Things Fall Apart and Life is sweet at Kumansenu, share a belief in the Obanji, but differ in family structure and religion.

In Both Life Is Sweet at Kumansenu and Things Fall Apart share the same belief in the dead. Death plays a large part of the Umuofians, and a large ceremony, while in Life is Sweet in Kumansenu, there is only a minimal burial. “She said Meji had died instantly at noon on Friday and had been buried on Saturday at sundown. They would have brought him to Kumansenu for burial. He had always wished that. But they could not do so in time, as bodies did not last more than a day in the hot season, and there were no trucks available for hire.” (Nicol 2) When someone dies in Umofia, a large ceremony is held with specific traditions, chants, dances and so forth."The land of the living was not far removed from the ancestors. There was coming and going between them, especially at festivals and also when an old man died, because an old man was very close to the

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