Voices from Nigeria

Voices from Nigeria Spoken by Chinua
Achebe
By Annisa
Stories from Africa are always interesting to read
and discuss, including Chinua Achebe’s stories.
Here I will analyze the structure of Achebe’s two
short stories titled Dead Man’s Path and Civil
Peace. Both short stories are originally written in
English but still with the style of Igbo, the
language of an ethnic group in the southeastern
Nigeria. The first discussion of this essay is the
working through of Dead Man’s Path, while Civil
Peace comes second.
Dead Man’s Path is a story about a young man
named Michael Ibo who is assigned to Ndume
Central School as a new headmaster. He is such
an enthusiastic and energetic man. He has a lot
of fresh ideas to make the traditional school
become a more modern one. His wife is along
with him. Both share ideas about bringing up
modernity to their new life in Ndume, including
to the school. The wife utters that they shall have
delightful gardens, a symbol of nice settlement.
Having her husband as a headmaster, the ruler
of the school, makes her want to be a queen of
whom the wives of the other teachers are envy,
by dressing and behaving fancily. However, she
was downcast after figuring out that the teachers
in the school are all single. There are no other
wives. This behavior of the Ibo family is one of
the phenomena appeared in the story. Passions
for modernity are clearly reflected on the
behavior of Michael Ibo and his wife, while
modernity is in contradiction with the setting of
place of the story, which is in Nigeria where
supernaturalism is tightly gripped by its people.
Here, supernaturalism is closely related to
traditionalism and old-fashioned life style.
After a while of sitting in his new position,
Michael succeeds in bringing modernity to the
school in several ways, whose one of the
examples is by building a garden (the garden
that his wife has always dreamed of) in the yard
of the school. His mission after all is to make
the school look forward-minded physically
besides to make the school performance
developed academically. Then, he soon found
out that local people often use the path on the
school yard as a walk through to the path
leading to the ancestor graves. He was not fine
with it for sure considering his belief that
supernaturalism and education should be
separated. He then built fences around the
school yard to prevent local people trespassing.
A priest, who seems to be a Christian priest,
comes to him to warn about what the new
headmaster is doing. Michael ignores the
warning and is forced to give payments as a
result. Some time after the fences are built, a
giving-born woman loses her child before it
manages to see the world, which triggers the
madness of local people. They think that the
fences around the school has given them bad
luck and then they destroy them without a
second thought. The next morning (right on the
day when the Government Education Officer
comes to assess), Michael’s jaw is wide open
when seeing the fences and the garden he has
built to beautify the school are all torn up.
Finding this overwhelming mess, the Government
Education Officer gives the new headmaster and
the school a bad report.
After reading the story closely, I find that the
binary opposition in this story is Michael and his
wife as the representative of modernity, and, the
priest and local people as the representative of
traditionalism. Both oppositions have
contradictory opinions toward how to live life.
Michael and his wife are two people with a hip
style and taste. They cannot blend with the
characterization of local people, which lead them
to cross the line. Be at cross purposes, the
priest and local people grip their supernaturalism
tradition strongly. So, we can conclude that this
story actually tells about a war between
traditionalism and modernism in Nigeria as
reflected on the main binary opposition.
Chinua Achebe, whose original name was Albert
Chinualumogu Achebe, was born on November
16, 1930, in the Igbo town of Ogidi in eastern
Nigeria. Although he was an Igbo born, he
committed to learning English as a second
language since he was eight years old. He said
that as a crossroad cultural person, he did not
mind learning language other than Igbo. It was
not that he wanted to betray his race but he only
wanted to promote African culture to the world.
To promote, he needed English as a mediator
language. He always wrote honestly about
African people with the style of Igbo (though
written in English). In his middle age, he moved
to the Unites States to teach in several
universities. This decision of leaving his home
country is an example of his view toward the
world. He did not want to cage himself in Africa,
instead, he traveled and taught around the world
to spread the news that not all Nigerians were
lack behind. His belief in modernity is clearly
reflected on the characterization in Dead Man’s
Path. It is questioned then whether he puts
himself in the story as the priest and local
people or as Michael Ibo.
The fact is that around the setting of time of the
story, in 1953, was when French colonized West
Africa. French had a mission to rebuild and
revamp the school system in Africa including the
Igbo cities in eastern Nigeria. To accomplish
this, missionaries were sent, and Michael Ibo is
probably one of those French missionaries (in
the story, there is no given detail about
Michael’s race, so I am just making a guess).
Missionaries assigned by colonizer are usually
full of enthusiasms of bringing new changes to
the environment, which is clearly seen in
Michael’s personality. They brought modernity
and new-fashioned passions, however,
sometimes they just do not know how to blend
with local people without crossing the line.
Not only Death Man’s Path, Chinua Achebe was
also well-known for his other short story titled
Civil Peace. It tells about Jonathan Iwegbu who
survives the Nigerian civil war along with his
wife and his three out of four children. Luck is
with him for sure. Soon after moving out of the
shelter, Jonathan found the bicycle that he buried
to keep safe is still in a good condition. He also
feels so much blessed for having his house
stands still, though needing a little reparation.
He and his family work really hard to start their
life all over again. Not even one of the family
members is lazy to work. Then, one day,
Jonathan is given 20 pounds after turning over
rebel currency. After receiving the money, he
tried to keep it safe from thieves. However, he
cannot run from such an unfortunate event. In the
night on the same day, when the Jonathan’s
family falls asleep, a group of thieves knocks
their door to ask for money. Jonathan gives
them his 20 pounds after all to make they be rid
of. The next morning, his neighbors wonder why
he and his family could continue working after
what happened the night before. Jonathan then
explained that money cannot ever pay what is
lost, so it is better for him to give up his money
than to give up his family.
Civil Peace is a story showing Nigerian people’s
positivity after the long and desperate civil war.
Jonathan himself is a depiction of optimism that
Achebe as the writer wants to show to the world
about Nigeria. Through all sadness, difficulties,
and disappointments, Jonathan can get up to
face the world again and to work to get a better
life.
Although the main theme of Dead Man’s Path
and Civil Peace is so much different, however,
the two share the same main background that is
the life of Nigerian People. In Dead Man’s Path,
it is figured that people in Nigeria are
superstitious. They believe in another power
related to their ancestors, and they also refuse
modernity that separates them with their faith.
Then, in Civil Peace, Nigerian people are
depicted as optimist people even after going
through tragic losses during the civil war. Both
short stories tell about the characteristics of
Nigeria. Chinua Achebe himself is a Nigerian, so
he fully understands about how his people live,
behave, and think. Therefore, the flow of his
stories are accurately composed. Although he
fully understands about his people, he does not
fully take their side. He still believes in
modernity and positivity (that is usually
understood as western people’s attitude) that
shall be achieved by Nigerian people in order to
build a better life. He vocalizes his opinions
through writing mostly in English to introduce the
world to Nigerian culture, and to teach his
people about open-mindedness.
Lit Analysis
Annisa
A lifelong learner who adores the earth, the sky,
and everything in between. All writings on this
blog are the fruits of her never-resting mind —
all rights kindly reserved.