Okonkwo's Arrogance In Things Fall Apart

Things fall apart is a tragedy novel written by Chinua Achebe. Okonkwo, who is the protagonist of the novel and one of the most powerful men in the Ibo tribe often resorts to violence to make his points understood. Down in his heart, Okonkwo is not a cruel man, but his life is dominated by his internal conflict, the fear of failure and of weakness. He hated his father, Unoka, because he was a lazy debtor. Okonkwo made it a point in his life to set himself apart from his father by being well known and wealthy as well as becoming a great warrior in the tribal conflicts of Umuofia and the surrounding villages.

But the desire to rise above every ambition of his is dragging him down in his personal life. The opening paragraph needs textual evidence. Use embedded quotes. In the beginning of the poem, he describes how much he hates a certain trait and how it is a burden to him. For example, he calls it by foul names which seem to show the extent on how much it affects him: “Thou blind man’s mark, thou fool’s self chosen snare.

Through the repetition, it is clear that he is determined about his viewpoint and expresses self-destructive behaviors that inhibit Oedipus and as a result, he starts recapping the events repeatedly in his mind. The word “misery” negatively connotes his performance and thus indicating that Oedipus is degrading himself as he believes he is not worthy of happiness, love and is exceedingly embarrassed about himself and the influence he brought upon his people. Therefore, he states that nobody should ever look at his“misery.” Oedipus is eager to distort his perception of himself from a pride man with a successful future transforming it into complete

His anger made him do things without thinking, which could end up harming him. His fear of being thought weak made Okonkwo do everything he could to appear more manly, which could end up with him harming himself or others. Because of his vulnerabilities, Okonkwo’s downfall was his own fault. Due to his anger, Okonkwo beat his wife during the week of peace, violating the rules of the week. He also killed Ikemefuna because “[h]e was afraid of being thought weak.” (61) These two actions were Okonkwo’s fault, and were caused by his vulnerabilities.

In the novel ‘Spies’, Mr. Hayward’s barbaric behaviour is like an 'ogre ' because it is preceded by a sense of rudeness, giving Keith a false sense of family. The word 'ogre ' has connotation of burtal and cruel direction creates a strong imagery from a child 's perspective. This suggest that a strict person in the eyes of children is a monster. Stephen narrates how strict and unfriendly Mr. Hayward towards his son such as: ‘Thermos’, he says’. This plain request implies that Mr. Hayward treats his house and family like military which restricts their freedom as soldiers and gives orders that must be fulfilled immediately or will face his ‘consequences’.

With injustice and cruelty running rampant in the world, it is unsurprising that people become determined to make things better for tomorrow. The cliché saying that the ends justify the means is often quoted by those aware of the moral greyness of their actions. Commendable yet unreasonable, leaders whose sole purpose in life is to fix what they see as “wrong” with the world fall prey to thinking there is only ally or enemy. In the long run, they harm those they try to liberate. This is the downfall of leaders in many works of literature, including Harrison Bergeron and The Lord of the Flies.

He does not know how to relate to other people. He regularly beats his wives and children for not living up to his expectations of them. Nwoye,Okonkwo’s son, is much like what Unoka was in Okonkwo’s eyes, both are lazy and incompetent. Okonkwo is convinced that constantly beating him will make him stronger, but he is only driving his son away further. All Nwoye has ever wanted is his father’s acceptance and approval.

Liza, for example, treasures the qualities of romantic love while the Underground Man is incapable of love. The Underground Man’s consistent theme of contradiction is exemplified throughout the story where he experiences a multitude of emotions ranging from narcissistic and egocentric to embarrassment and humiliation. Although the Underground Man envisions himself challenging those who have wronged him, he does not have the “moral courage” to stand up for himself. By remaining in the underground, the Underground Man is able to escape from reality where is able to manufacture his own world. An argument can be made that Dostoevsky used the personal aspects of the Underground Man to show the pattern of similarities between him and contemporary society.

Children learn from their parent’s mistakes and one thing Okonkwo learned was to rule by one thing” passion- to hate everything that his father Unoka had loved. One of those things was gentleness and another was idleness.” Therefore, he wants to raise Nwoye with fear and abuse since, his father raised him with gentleness. Okonkwo is afraid Nwoye will “be found to resemble his father” so, he treated him and Ikemefuna “with a heavy hand.” Okonkwo was “fond of the boy” but, he did not “express any emotion openly, unless it be the emotion of anger.” Therefore,” when Okonkwo heard that he would not eat any food he came into the hut with a big stick in his hand and stood over him while he swallowed his yams, trembling.” This shows that Okonkwo is raising Nwoye with fear so, he will raise up to be a successful man who will do what he is told no matter what and not be lazy. Okonkwo is scaring Nwoye that he will beat him so, he will listen to him. Everything Okonkwo is doing is because he “was not a cruel man.

The negative power is Ramses the second. A great and powerful ruler who uses his power to force people to do as he says. We can tell that he was not a kind ruler in the line "whose frown and wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command." Shelly paints a picture of a cruel leader who only cares about himself. Ozymandias expects this power to just be handed to him.