Things Fall Apart

Chinua Achebe

  Turning and turning in the widening gyre

  The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

  Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;

  Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.

  —W. B. Yeats, “The Second Coming”

  CHAPTER ONE

  Okonkwo was well known throughout the nine villages and even beyond. His fame
rested on solid personal achievements. As a young man of eighteen he had brought
honor to his village by throwing Amalinze the Cat. Amalinze was the great wrestler who
for seven years was unbeaten, from Umuofia to Mbaino. He was called the Cat because
his back would never touch the earth. It was this man that Okonkwo threw in a fight
which the old men agreed was one of the fiercest since the founder of their town
engaged a spirit of the wild for seven days and seven nights.

  The drums beat and the flutes sang and the spectators held their breath. Amalinze was
a wily craftsman, but Okonkwo was as slippery as a fish in water. Every nerve and every
muscle stood out on their arms, on their backs and their thighs, and one almost heard
them stretching to breaking point. In the end Okonkwo threw the Cat.

  That was many years ago, twenty years or more, and during this time Okonkwo’s fame
had grown like a bush-fire in the harmattan. He was tall and huge, and his bushy
eyebrows and wide nose gave him a very severe look. He breathed heavily, and it was
said that, when he slept, his wives and children in their houses could hear him breathe.
When he walked, his heels hardly touched the ground and he seemed to walk on springs,
as if he was going to pounce on somebody. And he did pounce on people quite often. He
had a slight stammer and whenever he was angry and could not get his words out
quickly enough, he would use his fists. He had no patience with unsuccessful men. He
had had no patience with his father.

  Unoka, for that was his father’s name, had died ten years ago. In his day he was lazy
and improvident and was quite incapable of thinking about tomorrow. If any money
came his way, and it seldom did, he immediately bought gourds of palm-wine, called
round his neighbors and made merry. He always said that whenever he saw a dead
man’s mouth he saw the folly of not eating what one had in one’s lifetime. Unoka was, of
course, a debtor, and he owed every neighbor some money, from a few cowries to quite
substantial amounts.
  He was tall but very thin and had a slight stoop. He wore a haggard and mournful look
except when he was drinking or playing on his flute. He was very good on his flute, and
his happiest moments were the two or three moons after the harvest when the village
musicians brought down their instruments, hung above the fireplace. Unoka would play
with them, his face beaming with blessedness and peace. Sometimes another village
would ask Unoka’s band and their dancing egwugwu to come and stay with them and
teach them their tunes. They would go to such hosts for as long as three or four markets,
making music and feasting. Unoka loved the good fare and the good fellowship, and he
loved this season of the year, when the rains had stopped and the sun rose every
morning with dazzling beauty. And it was not too hot either, because the cold and dry
harmattan wind was blowing down from the north. Some years the harmattan was very
severe and a dense haze hung on the atmosphere. Old men and children would then sit
round log fires, warming their bodies. Unoka loved it all, and he loved the first kites that
returned with the dry season, and the children who sang songs of welcome to them. He
would remember his own childhood, how he had often wandered around looking for a
kite sailing leisurely against the blue sky. As soon as he found one he would sing with his
whole being, welcoming it back from its long, long journey, and asking it if it had
brought home any lengths of cloth.

  That was years ago, when he was young. Unoka, the grown-up, was a failure. He was
poor and his wife and children had barely enough to eat. People laughed at him because
he was a loafer, and they swore never to lend him any more money because he never
paid back. But Unoka was such a man that he always succeeded in borrowing more, and
piling up his debts.

  One day a neighbor called Okoye came in to see him. He was reclining on a mud bed in
his hut playing on the flute. He immediately rose and shook hands with Okoye, who
then unrolled the goatskin which he carried under his arm, and sat down. Unoka went
into an inner room and soon returned with a small wooden disc containing a kola nut,
some alligator pepper and a lump of white chalk.

8th

  “I have kola,” he announced when he sat down, and passed the disc over to his guest.

  “Thank you. He who brings kola brings life. But I think you ought to break it,” replied
Okoye, passing back the disc.

  “No, it is for you, I think,” and they argued like this for a few moments before Unoka
accepted the honor of breaking the kola. Okoye, meanwhile, took the lump of chalk,
drew some lines on the floor, and then painted his big toe.

8th -end

  As he broke the kola, Unoka prayed to their ancestors for life and health, and for
protection against their enemies. When they had eaten they talked about many things:
about the heavy rains which were drowning the yams, about the next ancestral feast and
about the impending war with the village of Mbaino. Unoka was never happy when it
came to wars. He was in fact a coward and could not bear the sight of blood. And so he
changed the subject and talked about music, and his face beamed. He could hear in his
mind’s ear the blood-stirring and intricate rhythms of the ekwe and the udu and the
ogene, and he could hear his own flute weaving in and out of them, decorating them
with a colorful and plaintive tune. The total effect was gay and brisk, but if one picked
out the flute as it went up and down and then broke up into short snatches, one saw that
there was sorrow and grief there.

  Okoye was also a musician. He played on the ogene. But he was not a failure like
Unoka. He had a large barn full of yams and he had three wives. And now he was going
to take the Idemili title, the third highest in the land. It was a very expensive ceremony
and he was gathering all his resources together. That was in fact the reason why he had
come to see Unoka. He cleared his throat and began:

  “Thank you for the kola. You may have heard of the title I intend to take shortly.”

10th end

  Having spoken plainly so far, Okoye said the next half a dozen sentences in proverbs.
Among the Ibo the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the
palm-oil with which words are eaten. Okoye was a great talker and he spoke for a long
time, skirting round the subject and then hitting it finally. In short, he was asking Unoka
to return the two hundred cowries he had borrowed from him more than two years
before. As soon as Unoka understood what his friend was driving at, he burst out
laughing. He laughed loud and long and his voice rang out clear as the ogene, and tears
stood in his eyes. His visitor was amazed, and sat speechless. At the end, Unoka was able
to give an answer between fresh outbursts of mirth.

  “Look at that wall,” he said, pointing at the far wall of his hut, which was rubbed with
red earth so that it shone. “Look at those lines of chalk,” and Okoye saw groups of short
perpendicular lines drawn in chalk. There were five groups, and the smallest group had
ten lines. Unoka had a sense of the dramatic and so he allowed a pause, in which he took
a pinch of snuff and sneezed noisily, and then he continued: “Each group there
represents a debt to someone, and each stroke is one hundred cowries. You see, I owe
that man a thousand cowries. But he has not come to wake me up in the morning for it. I
shall pay you, but not today. Our elders say that the sun will shine on those who stand
before it shines on those who kneel under them. I shall pay my big debts first.” And he
took another pinch of snuff, as if that was paying the big debts first. Okoye rolled his
goatskin and departed.

  When Unoka died he had taken no title at all and he was heavily in debt. Any wonder
then that his son Okonkwo was ashamed of him? Fortunately, among these people a
man was judged according to his worth and not according to the worth of his father.
Okonkwo was clearly cut out for great things. He was still young but he had won fame as
the greatest wrestler in the nine villages. He was a wealthy farmer and had two barns
full of yams, and had just married his third wife. To crown it all he had taken two titles
and had shown incredible prowess in two inter-tribal wars. And so although Okonkwo
was still young, he was already one of the greatest men of his time. Age was respected
among his people, but achievement was revered. As the elders said, if a child washed his
hands he could eat with kings. Okonkwo had clearly washed his hands and so he ate
with kings and elders. And that was how he came to look after the doomed lad who was
sacrificed to the village of Umuofia by their neighbors to avoid war and bloodshed. The
ill-fated lad was called Ikemefuna.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Okonkwo had just blown out the palm-oil lamp and stretched himself on his bamboo
bed when he heard the ogene of the town crier piercing the still night air. Gome, gome,
gome, gome, boomed the hollow metal. Then the crier gave his message, and at the end
of it beat his instrument again. And this was the message. Every man of Umuofia was
asked to gather at the market place tomorrow morning. Okonkwo wondered what was
amiss, for he knew certainly that something was amiss. He had discerned a clear
overtone of tragedy in the crier’s voice, and even now he could still hear it as it grew
dimmer and dimmer in the distance.

  The night was very quiet. It was always quiet except on moonlight nights. Darkness
held a vague terror for these people, even the bravest among them. Children were
warned not to whistle at night for fear of evil spirits. Dangerous animals became even
more sinister and uncanny in the dark. A snake was never called by its name at night,
because it would hear. It was called a string. And so on this particular night as the crier’s
voice was gradually swallowed up in the distance, silence returned to the world, a
vibrant silence made more intense by the universal trill of a million million forest
insects.

  On a moonlight night it would be different. The happy voices of children playing in

open fields would then be heard. And perhaps those not so young would be playing in
pairs in less open places, and old men and women would remember their youth. As the
Ibo say: “When the moon is shining the cripple becomes hungry for a walk.”

  But this particular night was dark and silent. And in all the nine villages of Umuofia a
town crier with his ogene asked every man to be present tomorrow morning. Okonkwo
on his bamboo bed tried to figure out the nature of the emergency—war with a
neighboring clan? That seemed the most likely reason, and he was not afraid of war. He
was a man of action, a man of war. Unlike his father he could stand the look of blood. In
Umuofia’s latest war he was the first to bring home a human head. That was his fifth
head; and he was not an old man yet. On great occasions such as the funeral of a village
celebrity he drank his palm-wine from his first human head.

  In the morning the market place was full. There must have been about ten thousand
men there, all talking in low voices. At last Ogbuefi Ezeugo stood up in the midst of
them and bellowed four times, “Umuofia kwenu,” and on each occasion he faced a
different direction and seemed to push the air with a clenched fist. And ten thousand
men answered “Yaa!” each time. Then there was perfect silence. Ogbuefi Ezeugo was a
powerful orator and was always chosen to speak on such occasions. He moved his hand
over his white head and stroked his white beard. He then adjusted his cloth, which was
passed under his right arm-pit and tied above his left shoulder.

  “Umuofia kwenu,” he bellowed a fifth time, and the crowd yelled in answer. And then
suddenly like one possessed he shot out his left hand and pointed in the direction of
Mbaino, and said through gleaming white teeth firmly clenched: “Those sons of wild
animals have dared to murder a daughter of Umuofia.” He threw his head down and
gnashed his teeth, and allowed a murmur of suppressed anger to sweep the crowd.
When he began again, the anger on his face was gone and in its place a sort of smile
hovered, more terrible and more sinister than the anger. And in a clear unemotional
voice he told Umuofia how their daughter had gone to market at Mbaino and had been
killed. That woman, said Ezeugo, was the wife of Ogbuefi Udo, and he pointed to a man
who sat near him with a bowed head. The crowd then shouted with anger and thirst for
blood.

  Many others spoke, and at the end it was decided to follow the normal course of action.
An ultimatum was immediately dispatched to Mbaino asking them to choose between
war on the one hand, and on the other the offer of a young man and a virgin as
compensation.

  Umuofia was feared by all its neighbors. It was powerful in war and in magic, and its
priests and medicine men were feared in all the surrounding country. Its most potent
war-medicine was as old as the clan itself. Nobody knew how old. But on one point there
was general agreement—the active principle in that medicine had been an old woman
with one leg. In fact, the medicine itself was called agadi-nwayi, or old woman. It had its
shrine in the centre of Umuofia, in a cleared spot. And if anybody was so foolhardy as to
pass by the shrine after dusk he was sure to see the old woman hopping about.

  And so the neighboring clans who naturally knew of these things feared Umuofia, and
would not go to war against it without first trying a peaceful settlement. And in fairness
to Umuofia it should be recorded that it never went to war unless its case was clear and
just and was accepted as such by its Oracle—the Oracle of the Hills and the Caves. And
there were indeed occasions when the Oracle had forbidden Umuofia to wage a war. If
the clan had disobeyed the Oracle they would surely have been beaten, because their
dreaded agadi-nwayi would never fight what the Ibo call a fight of blame.

  But the war that now threatened was a just war. Even the enemy clan knew that. And
so when Okonkwo of Umuofia arrived at Mbaino as the proud and imperious emissary
of war, he was treated with great honor and respect, and two days later he returned
home with a lad of fifteen and a young virgin. The lad’s name was Ikemefuna, whose sad
story is still told in Umuofia unto this day.

  The elders, or ndichie, met to hear a report of Okonkwo’s mission. At the

end they decided, as everybody knew they would, that the girl should go to Ogbuefi Udo
to replace his murdered wife. As for the boy, he belonged to the clan as a whole, and
there was no hurry to decide his fate. Okonkwo was, therefore, asked on behalf of the
clan to look after him in the interim. And so for three years Ikemefuna lived in
Okonkwo’s household.

  Okonkwo ruled his household with a heavy hand. His wives, especially the youngest,
lived in perpetual fear of his fiery temper, and so did his little children. Perhaps down in
his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man. But his whole life was dominated by fear, the
fear of failure and of weakness. It was deeper and more intimate than the fear of evil and
capricious gods and of magic, the fear of the forest, and of the forces of nature,
malevolent, red in tooth and claw. Okonkwo’s fear was greater than these. It was not
external but lay deep within himself. It was the fear of himself, lest he should be found
to resemble his father. Even as a little boy he had resented his father’s failure and
weakness, and even now he still remembered how he had suffered when a playmate had
told him that his father was agbala. That was how Okonkwo first came to know that
agbala was not only another name for a woman, it could also mean a man who had taken
no title. And so Okonkwo was ruled by one passion—to hate everything that his father
Unoka had loved. One of those things was gentleness and another was idleness.

  During the planting season Okonkwo worked daily on his farms from cock-crow until
the chickens went to roost. He was a very strong man and rarely felt fatigue. But his
wives and young children were not as strong, and so they suffered. But they dared not
complain openly. Okonkwo’s first son, Nwoye, was then twelve years old but was already
causing his father great anxiety for his incipient laziness. At any rate, that was how it
looked to his father, and he sought to correct him by constant nagging and beating. And
so Nwoye was developing into a sad-faced youth.

Taken from: https://bookfrom.net/chinua-achebe/34854-things_fall_apart.html