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Things Fall Apart is set in the 1890s, during the coming of the "white man" to Nigeria. The novel portrays the clash between the white's colonial government and the traditional culture of the Igbo people. The novel is about a very strong man's rise to great prestige, fortune and power which in the end were overshadowed by his inevitable death. Okonkwo's demise was not because of colonization, but rather his downfall was attributed by his obsession with masculinity. Okonkwo's one and only weakness, his fear of becoming a failure like his father, drove Okonkwo to embrace the values of manliness, because for all of his desire to be strong, he was haunted by fear. This fear drove him to rashness, and in the end contributed to his death. Another one of Okonkwo's weaknesses was portrayed through the way he defined masculinity so narrowly. Okonkwo was apart of a patriarchal society and the male gender was already established with great authority. For Okonkwo, however, any kind of softness......

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Approximate Word Count: 508
Approximate Pages: 3 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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