Why else do we live?

I have been beyond impressed by Cry, The Beloved Country. While I enjoyed Things Fall Apart, Achebe does not write with the same passion as Paton. The richness of the plot in Cry, the language, the pace, the emotion all make this a most enjoyable summer read. At the same time, I have been listening [...]

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The Conscience in Us All: Part II

In Things Fall Apart, after Okonkwo has been banished from the tribe for seven years after inadvertently killing someone, a friend of Okonkwo’s reflects,
Why should a man suffer so grievously for an offense he had committed inadvertently? But although he thought for a long time he found no answer. He was merely led into greater complexities. He [...]

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Believing despite knowing

In The Village (a must watch for any Christian) the leaders keep the rest of the group in the dark about certain things in order to perserve their way of life. (Even though this is “Thoughts on what I am reading…,” it might be worth it at some point to discuss that movie.) No one [...]

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The Conscience in Us All

When Nwoye, Okonkwo’s son, realizes that someone has been killed in Things Fall Apart, Achebe describes his reaction this way, “…something seemed to give way inside him, like the snapping of a tightened bow. He did not cry. He just hung limp. He had the same kind of feeling not long ago…They were returning home…when [...]

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Throwing the baby out with the bath water

Okonkwo is the main character in Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. The first chapter deals with the dichotomy between Okonkwo and his father. Because his father lived a life of sloth and weakness, Okonkwo was determined not to. “And so Okonkwo was ruled by one passion—to hate everything that his father Unoka had loved.” 
I [...]

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