Synopsis: In the late 19th century as expounded in Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, a proud Igbo warrior named Okonkwo fights to hold his community together as British colonial rule and Christian missionaries arrive to unravel everything he knows.
Chinua Achebe’s landmark debut is the most widely read novel in modern African literature — a devastating, unflinching portrait of a world falling apart.
Okonkwo is a man built on strength — a celebrated wrestler, a fierce provider, a leader among the Igbo people of Umuofia. He has spent his life running from the shame of his father’s failures, determined to be everything his father was not. But the world Okonkwo has built his identity on is about to be shaken by forces far beyond his control, as British colonial administrators and Christian missionaries arrive, bringing with them a new order that has no place for the old ways.
Told with the rhythm and texture of Igbo oral tradition, Achebe’s novel refuses to romanticize or simplify — it shows a fully realized society, with its own laws, rituals, contradictions, and humanity, and then shows how colonization tears at its foundations. As Okonkwo’s resistance grows more desperate, the novel becomes both an intimate tragedy and a sweeping account of a continent’s history rewritten from the inside.
First published in 1958, Things Fall Apart has sold over 20 million copies, been translated into more than 50 languages, and become required reading in classrooms worldwide — the book that gave modern African literature its true global voice. Barack Obama called it a masterpiece that inspired generations of writers across Africa and beyond. This compact edition puts a landmark of world literature in your pocket.
Buy Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe Now
- Title: Things Fall Apart
- Author: Chinua Achebe
- Publisher: Penguin Books (Heinemann African Writers Series, Red Classics)
- Publication date: 2006 (this compact edition)
- Format: Paperback (pocket-size)
- ISBN-13: 9780141023380
- Pages: 197 pages
- Genre: African literature / Classic fiction
- Condition: Very Good
- Availability: Sold
- Price: KES550
Notable: Achebe’s 1958 debut novel — the most widely read book in modern African literature, translated into over 50 languages, and named by Barack Obama as a masterpiece that has inspired generations of writers across Africa and the world
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