The Poisonwood Bible or Things Fall Apart

Everyone in the villages knew their place and their contribution to the tribe as a whole , and as long as everyone did their part and kept to the rules that had been in effect for hundreds of years , life ran smoothly . Achebe paints a picture of a society that might not make a lot of sense to outsiders , but worked out just fine for the people within it . The underlying argument is Why force change on something that works

The second portion of the book follows Okonkwo 's life during the seven

years that he was banished for accidentally killing a man (Achebe 1959 . He and his family were made to move to the land of his mother and although they were greeted warmly and openly , it is obvious that Okonkwo misses his old life and the prestige he had within it (Achebe 1959 . While he does his part in this new tribe and follows the rules he always keeps in his mind the idea that he will be going back home with his family , and he will step right in and start working on regaining his prestige in the village immediately (Achebe , 1959 . There is one problem that comes up in his plan , and that is the arrival of the white man . These white men are missionaries , evidently from England that want to bring Christianity to the pagan African tribes (Achebe 1959 . At first things go smoothly , but then the white man begins to enforce the laws of the regular world on the tribal world (Achebe 1959 . The Africans begin to be put in jail for offences that their rules clearly spell out their own punishment for . While some of the tribal punishments and actions seemed cruel , the white man begins to seem crueler . Achebe 's argument in this...