Things Fall Apart Theme Chapter 23 to End

The main theme of Things Fall Apart is to never let fear control your life. Okonkwo was haunted by his father's embarrassing reputation, and was so terrified of following in his father's footsteps, so he vowed to never become like his father. Okonkwo strived to be heartless, angry, strong, and to never feel any emotion other than anger. But little did he know that the entire time, his "anger" was actually fear. Ikemefuna, a boy who Okonkwo raised and who called him "father" was to be killed, and, so that he would not appear weak, Okonkwo helped to kill the boy himself. Achebe writes "Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being thought weak" (53). The fact that Okonkwo could mindlessly kill somebody so close to him really conveys his crippling fear of being thought of as weak. Ironically, Okonkwo ends up hanging himself, consumed in depression, at the end of the book. In the Ibo culture, it is considered dishonorable to commit suicide, so he is never given a proper burial. Guess who else never got a proper burial? His father, the man he was trying his entire life to never become. Fate works in funny ways.http://www.gunaxin.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Daddy-Issues-10-560x304.jpg