Freudian Unconscious and the Remaking of Self: An analysis of Okonkwo in Achebe's Things Fall Apart From Psychoanalytic Perspective

Abstract

Okonkwo, in Achebe's Things Fall Apart is a very complex character with different paradoxical qualities in terms of social, cultural, political, parental and ideological issues. His roles as a father, husband, son, leader of the clan, hero, the custodian of the would-be-sacrificing boy Ikemefuna, and his beheading of the boy lead us to a crossroad of Freudian unconscious. The unconscious, as the container of the suppressed desires caused by his father's agbala (womanish) characteristics, leads him to kill the boy as he does not want to be treated like his father. His jaundiced psychological state is responsible for breaking relation with his son Nwoye, treating his family members very unnaturally, being very aggressive in tribal issues, and finally, committing suicide after the killing of the messenger in the meeting. The irreducible autopsy of his father's failure in his practical life always functions as a Freudian Id in Okonkwo which tries to come out to demolish his past and recreate a renewed present where his father stands as a hero. My objective in this article is to show how Freudian unconscious leads Okonkwo to create a self of a hero but his heroic self is nothing but a failed attempt to recreate his father.