If there is one thing I know for certain, it's that when someone tells you something over and over, you begin to believe it slowly but surely. In The Madman by Chinua Achebe, a man goes crazy simply because he's told he's insane. This shows the amount of influence and power that others have on our lives can be rather scary, and shows the terrible side-effects of emotional abuse. If you tell someone enough times that they are worthless, ugly, fat and other horrible things enough times they will believe it, and it creates this inner battle that the abused person has to fight every day. This is what the colonizers did to the African people. The colonizers told the African people that they were nothing more than stupid animals, and as the African people began to believe it they became easier and easier to take over. Then this mind set gets passed down to their children and generations of people believe they are worthless. This is the problem that Achebe is addressing in The Madman.
Achebe also loves irony as a way to criticize society. It appears in Girls At War and The Madman. In Girls At War, Achebe kills off Gladys who gives selflessly to others while he allows Nwankwo to live even though he is selfish. This instance of irony portrays the phrases the good die young and it's the survival of the fittest. Even though this is what he's showing, he's actually telling us what should not happen. In this aspect, I agree with Achebe, the world shouldn't punish people for being kind because ignorant people take advantage.
In Achebe's scathing article An Image of Africa, I didn't know what to think and I still don't. Since I haven't read Heart of Darkness by Joeseph Conrad, I neither had been allowed to form my own opinion, nor had the opportunity to see if I noticed the apparent blatant racism in the novel for myself. I know that Achebe had something to prove, but was it so necessary to be so blatantly mean? Since I hadn't read the book myself I could only sympathize with Achebe and could not join in on his passionate hatred of the book. I have to say, however, that he was successful in convincing me not to read the book unless completely necessary.
I can tell you, having read Heart of Darkness, that Achebe is not over-reacting. It is truly an icky book, if I may use a technical term. I hope you do not have to read it unless you decide to check it out of the library from sheer curiosity. It really is as bad as he says, but don't take my word for it: check it out.
ReplyDeleteI like how you add your personal opinion at the end of each story analysis. In your next posting, see if you can deepen that analysis by explaining how your personal perspective informs how you came to your analysis of the story.