Setting in Chinua Achebe's "Things Fall Apart" Anonymous 11th Grade

Perhaps one of the most influential elements of literature, a setting may potentially dictate the plotline of a story, establishing culture, tradition, and a backstory. Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart sees an African world that largely revolves around the geographical location of Nigeria; this agricultural society serves as the vast foundation for a polytheistic religion and a reverence for the land itself. Not only are the values of the community of Umuofia meaningfully constructed upon this locational guideline, but the very essence of the protagonist, Okonkwo, and his unparalleled mindset, originates from this venerable attitude. In turn, the author himself, Chinua Achebe, brilliantly shares a traditional culture that is inherently dependent on the land itself, and how it inevitably leads to a clash of civilization where things truly “Fall Apart”.

Chinua Achebe attempts, and succeeds, to share a unique African culture that is inevitably and blatantly based on an agricultural society. Within this culture, the great value of yams, palm oil, and the kola nut are demonstrated as forms of wealth. In the first chapter of the book, Okonkwo is described as, “still young[,] but he had won fame as the greatest wrestler in the nine...