This book gave me a hard time because I entered the dichotomy of loving and hating the protagonist Okwonko.
On the one hand we have this timeline of a father who is as useless as a flower can be, and his son who at an early age decided that he wanted nothing to do with him, and so he worked and worked and worked in order to succeed and have all the honours and titles of his tribe, and so he did, or almost did. And that tenacity is what I admired of Okwonko, and the fact that he really did care for his wives.
But on the other hand we have an Okwonko incapable of sharing joyful feelings, or sharing a word of gratitude towards his own family, and who had no other joy but the joy of war and fights.
And it is sad, since as we advance in the reading and find the different stories that relates to the main of Okwonko we notice how he is no more than a coward itself, he doesn't want to be weak, but the determination to never show any weakness and never tell his feelings converted him in an isolated man who ended in the same disgraceful way than his father did.
So apart from this love/hate relationship that I shared with Okwonko there were a few more aspects that caught my attention:
First of all the Gods, how is it possible than living on such different continents, and with generations of distance all the ancient tribes and civilizations worshipped the same kind of Gods. Ok , in fact is no surprise for me, but it is amazing how nature and its constant changes and seasons drives people that has no knowledge of how that works ends up creating rulers or gods that helps them get through each day and year without getting mad or questioning everything.
Second of call, the white men ruins everything, that statement came to me as soon as in the book it was mentioned a silver horse and the man who rode it. We can find other cultures cruel or pagans, or even we can believe that they are uncivilized but what stand do we have! each tribe, civilization, country is different and has different traditions and beliefs, why did Europeans have to go an say that there is only one truth, when that only truth is in fact that no truth exists, I think that as long as you don't cross the limits of harming another human being you can believe anything you want to.
Also the reason that most of the traditions and languages (Ancient) disappeared was because of colonialism.
And finally and as a conclusion, I want to express my love for the name of the book, and how by just reading it we know that things are not going to go well in the book, we can still hope for calamities to be just mere accidents, but again, life is not that good and this book is calamities after calamities.
And it is sad, since as we advance in the reading and find the different stories that relates to the main of Okwonko we notice how he is no more than a coward itself, he doesn't want to be weak, but the determination to never show any weakness and never tell his feelings converted him in an isolated man who ended in the same disgraceful way than his father did.
So apart from this love/hate relationship that I shared with Okwonko there were a few more aspects that caught my attention:
First of all the Gods, how is it possible than living on such different continents, and with generations of distance all the ancient tribes and civilizations worshipped the same kind of Gods. Ok , in fact is no surprise for me, but it is amazing how nature and its constant changes and seasons drives people that has no knowledge of how that works ends up creating rulers or gods that helps them get through each day and year without getting mad or questioning everything.
Second of call, the white men ruins everything, that statement came to me as soon as in the book it was mentioned a silver horse and the man who rode it. We can find other cultures cruel or pagans, or even we can believe that they are uncivilized but what stand do we have! each tribe, civilization, country is different and has different traditions and beliefs, why did Europeans have to go an say that there is only one truth, when that only truth is in fact that no truth exists, I think that as long as you don't cross the limits of harming another human being you can believe anything you want to.Also the reason that most of the traditions and languages (Ancient) disappeared was because of colonialism.
And finally and as a conclusion, I want to express my love for the name of the book, and how by just reading it we know that things are not going to go well in the book, we can still hope for calamities to be just mere accidents, but again, life is not that good and this book is calamities after calamities.
I totally agree with your feeling of loving the name of the book. It´s so accurate. Moreover, it is really interesting when, as a reader, you understand that in the story things do not just fall apart, instead it is like things have been swept away as if they did not matter at all, as if everything the Igbo culture had to offer disappeared in the blink of an eye when the christian Europeans arrived to Africa. Great entry by the way ;)
ResponderEliminarThere's a fragment in the book that really got me thinking, and it discusses the topic of religion. There's this christian priest and and Igbo leader discussing their religions. The Christian priest insisted that the Igbo people only believed in false gods that were represented by common objects such as the rocks, the woods, etc. But the Igbo leaders argues back that In the end Christians and Igbo people believed in the same things, only with different names. And that's a reality, after all most religions around the world, as you have said, share some similarities. In the end I really think that everyone believes in shades of the same thing.
ResponderEliminarI also think that things begin to fall apart when we are unable to recognise other as equals, And I believe that the white men of those years really failed to do so. That's why perhaps it seems that everything is ruined by the white men, because the white men believes he owns the world: I believe we share it
Great entry !