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Things Fall Apart

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What drives you? Is it fear? Well, for Okonkwo fear takes over his life and is what drives him. In the novel the main character Okonkwo is faced with many different challenges to face as well as his way of life falling to the waste side. Throughout the Novel Things Fall Apart Okonkwo has the fear of not only being thought weak, but also ending up like his father. The great lengths he goes to prove his manliness affect the people closest to him as well as the entire village.

A pivotal thing in the novel is what Okonkwo must do to hide his fear so that nobody can see how he is becoming weak or unmanly. As well as his overall overpowering dread of being thought fragile. On many occasions Okonkwo had to hide his emotions for fear that people would speculate as to say he was weak. When emotion is conveyed a man would immediately speculated as to be a women or not a man. When showing remorse for some of his prior actions he talked to himself saying:”Okonkwo you have become a woman indeed” (65). Showing any kind of emotion meant that you would be considered weak so Okonkwo had to hide some of him emotions. In time of him being anxious he had to hide it:”…for although nobody knew it he had not slept at all last night” (112). This shows that he would sometimes hold in what any other person would say in conversation in order to keep him manly status. The things Okonkwo must do to avoid being thought of as weak are far reaching and affect the ones closest to him. Okonkwo had to kill...

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Submitted by: HRM2011
Date Submitted: 05-09-2010
Category: People
Words: 677
Pages: 2.71