History, Narrative and Cultural Representation in "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe (Page 2/2 ◄Return to Page 1)

 

Other essays and articles in the Literature Archives related to this topic include : Women, Colonization& Cultural Change in "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe  •  Comparison of Tragic Characters in Things Fall Apart and Oedipus the King  •   Comparison Essay on Things Fall Apart and My Antonia

 

Gikandi’s example of the yam in "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe raises other important issues that, while perhaps external to the fiction text itself, impact both its construction and its interpretation nonetheless. As Begam points out, the act of writing or of reading a novel that is identified like "Things Fall Apart" as a postcolonial text, as is the case for "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe, raises a number of questions that in most cases lack immediate and obvious answers (396). Specifically, Begam writes, there are three questions that must be asked of these texts and the ways in which history and narrative intersect and diverge. The first of these questions is, “[W]here do postcolonial writers locate their past?” The second question is, “[C]an we neatly separate the different historical strands that traverse and intersect these various epochs?” Finally, Begam asks, [W]hat historical stance should postcolonial writers assume toward their own history….?” (396). In order to answer these questions, the respective roles of the writer and the reader are important to consider, especially when thinking about a text that represents a place and a people with whom the reader is not immediately and intimately familiar. As Begam explains, Achebe’s novel represents a particular transitional moment in Nigerian history, and the indeterminate quality of the period about which Achebe has written, in which “the passing away of traditional Igbo culture” is depicted, makes the task of answering such questions even more challenging (397).

 

Is the reader to understand "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe as a history? Begam contends that the answer to this question is yes; Things Fall Apart is fiction, but it is historical in nature. By representing a group of people who are not widely known beyond their own homeland, Achebe constructs a nationalist history that is important and which performs a certain cultural service, at least in Begam’s view, because Achebe is writing an “adversarial history” “against… ‘colonialist’ discourse, against the attitudes and assumptions, the language and rhetoric that characterized British colonial rule in Nigeria” (398). Yet, understanding what Begam refers to as the “metahistory” of "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe can become a far more complicated undertaking. Such as task involves the consideration of variables that are external to the novel itself, engaging still more challenging questions about how readers receive and interpret narratives. Among these questions raised by issues of narrative and history in "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe are whether the reader considers only the text itself, or whether one reads and interprets based on the text and what they know about the author and the sociohistorical moment in which the text was written. In fact, it may well be the case that none of the questions posed by Begam can be answered without knowing something about Achebe’s own background and interests, a subject that is beyond the scope of the present essay.

 

Ultimately, what is left out of the history of "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe becomes as important as that which is included. Quayson contends that the major problem of representation of culture and history in this novel is that "the representationalist readings that relate to the work are… valid [but] grossly inadequate” (118). Quayson reserves particular criticism for Achebe’s portrayal of women, which she considers partial and limiting. In order to avoid the danger of taking women as “mimetic of an African reality” (118), Quayson recommends that the reader “adopt a multi-tiered approach” to reading Achebe’s work, and that of “and to African literature in general” (118). For the ordinary reader, though, such a request may be too demanding. When a reader has to look beyond the text in order to understand it, the fiction narrative begins to lose some of its power.

 

"Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe is a relatively straightforward narrative with an easy to follow plot and themes that are ripe for simple thesis statements on the novel. Were it only a narrative intended to entertain or instruct, it would be a simple read. However, the interpretation of this novel, particularly with respect to the intersection of history and narrative, is complicated by a number of questions about the writer’s knowledge, his motives, and his particular version of a single truth about a Nigerian tribal culture. Interpretation is further complicated by what the reader knows or does not know about this culture when he or she encounters the text. Thus, the intersections of history and narration become crucial interpretive concerns for critics and readers alike. Readers must exercise their responsibility to examine texts, whether historical or fictive in nature, and come to an understanding of how history and narration shape one another.

 

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Works Cited

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. New York: Anchor, 1994.

Begam, Richard. "Achebe's sense of an ending: History and tragedy in Things Fall Apart." Studies in the Novel 29.3 (1997): 396-411.

Gikandi, Simon. "Chinua Achebe and the Invention of African Culture." Research in African Literatures 32.3 (2001): 3-8.

Quayson, Ato. "Realism, Criticism, and the Disguises of Both: A reading of Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart." Research in African Literatures 25.4 (1994): 117-136.

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