Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart is a definitive, academic audio guide for undergraduate and postgraduate students of English Literature. In this episode of Literary Rides, we engage closely with one of the most influential novels of the twentieth century. This text reshaped the global understanding of Africa and redefined the possibilities of postcolonial writing in English.

The episode begins by situating Things Fall Apart within its historical and cultural context, offering listeners a clear understanding of pre-colonial Igbo society—its social organisation, religious beliefs, kinship structures, and systems of justice—before tracing the gradual and disruptive arrival of colonial administration and Christian missionary activity. Achebe’s project of “writing back” to colonial misrepresentations is foregrounded as a central intellectual and ethical concern of the novel.

Moving through the narrative with interpretive focus, the discussion examines the rise and fall of Okonkwo as a tragic protagonist whose personal fears, rigid masculinity, and obsession with honour mirror the wider disintegration of communal life. Key relationships, including those with Unoka, Ikemefuna, and Nwoye, are analysed to reveal the novel’s exploration of authority, violence, generational conflict, and moral ambiguity.

The episode also offers detailed thematic and stylistic analysis, addressing issues of tradition and change, patriarchy, fate and free will, religion and power, and the ethics of law and punishment. Achebe’s narrative technique—his use of proverbs, oral storytelling rhythms, symbolism, and a carefully modulated English shaped by African speech patterns—is examined as a crucial element of the novel’s enduring power.

In its final movement, the episode reflects on the novel’s tragic ending and its devastating irony, particularly the colonial gaze that reduces complex lives and cultures to administrative footnotes. Designed as a comprehensive listening-based study guide, this episode is ideal for UG and PG students, UGC NET/SET aspirants, teachers, and readers seeking a nuanced, humane, and critically informed understanding of Things Fall Apart and its continuing relevance in contemporary literary study.