The punishment for Okonkwo is to be exiled to his mother village.Do you feel the punishment fits the crime ?what are your thoughts on the nature and fairness of the penalty Okonkwo has to pay?
I think the punishment is the natural evolution related to Okonkwo's tragic flaw. Although the event is an accident, it should also be remembered that Ezeudu was the man who warned Okonkwo not to take hand in Ikemefuna's death. The disaster, a seeming accident, seems to confirm the fears of Obierika, who warned Okonkwo that the earth goddess did not smile on Okonkwo's participation in Ikemefuna's murder. However, the incident here is as literary as it is mystical; the calamity taking place at Ezeudu's funeral is a kind of poetic justice more than it is an example of divine retribution. It is one of many incidents in the novel where tribal ceremonies and rites resonate with the novel's central action.
