Chapters 3 and 4
Chapter 3
A
story is told in Umuofia about Okonkwo’s father, Unoka, and his visit to the
Oracle to find out why he always had a miserable harvest.
The Oracle is named Agbala and is always consulted in misfortunes. This Oracle lives in a shrine in a cave with an opening just
big enough to crawl into on one’s belly, and his priestess stands by the
sacred fire and interprets the will of the god.
When Unoka arrived there, he began to tell of his bad luck despite
sacrificing to the gods, but the priestess interrupted him to scream that he
didn’t prosper simply because he was lazy and did not work like a man.
Unoki had a bad chi or personal god and was ill-fated. He died of “the swelling which is an abomination to the
earth goddess”; victims of this disease were not allowed to die at home and
instead were abandoned in the forest, unburied.
Unoki took his flute with him when he was led out to die.
Okonkwo was possessed by the fear of his father’s shameful life and
death. He contracted to work for a
wealthy man named Nwakibie, after going through a ritual of breaking a kola nut
and drinking palm wine with the man’s family.
Okonkwo receives 800 yam seeds from Nwakibie in exchange for giving him
two thirds of the harvest, and eventually manages to rebuild his father’s barn
and feed his mother and sisters while share-cropping for Nwakibie.
(They worked hard but grew women’s crops like coco-yams, beans, and
cassava, not yam, which was a man’s crop.)
That first year, however, there is first a drought and then a flood, and
no farmer has a good crop. Okonkwo
nearly despairs, and Unoki offers him words of consoling wisdom which aggravate
Okonkwo still more.
Chapter 4
Okonkwo
can be very harsh to unsuccessful men because he has worked so hard. At an ancestral feast, he is reproved by the entire gathering
and encouraged to apologize because he called a man without any titles “agbala”—the
insulting word which a playmate had once called Okonkwo’s father.
Everyone respects the hard work of Okonkwo, however, and give him
positions of trust.
The village’s hostage, Ikemefuna, stays in Okonkwo’s household for
three years while the elders apparently forget about him.
Okonkwo’s wife is very kind to him, but he still misses his family:
during the first few weeks, Okonkwo has to threaten him with a stick before he
will eat in his new home. Ikemefuna
is lively and has clever skills, and becomes very popular, even with Okonkwo,
who tries to hide his affection.
That year Okonkwo breaks a holiday called the Week of Peace, which occurs
in the carefree season between harvest and planting.
His youngest wife, Ojiugo, doesn’t prepare dinner on time and so he
beats her when she returns home, forgetting it is the sacred Week of Peace.
The neighbors hear, and Ezeani, the priest of the Earth goddess Ani,
warns Okonkwo that his sacrilege could harm the harvest and orders him to make a
large sacrifice in penitence. Okonkwo
sacrifices and repents, but is too proud inwardly to admit to his neighbors that
he was wrong, which makes the other villagers think he has no respect for the
gods. His offence is a rare and serious one, so they mutter that he
was not punished enough.
Okonkwo, his son Nwoye, and Ikemefuna prepare yam seeds for planting.
Okonkwo berates them for not being more skilled at the job, especially
since yams are a symbol of manliness, even though he knows they are too young to
be perfectly skilled at the task. After
they plant the rainy season begins, and everyone stays indoors waiting for the
crops to grow and the rains to stop. Nwoye
and Ikemefuna become extremely close, and Ikemefuna tells Nwoye many stories and
vivid folk tales from his home clan.
