Masculinity In Macbeth And Things Fall Apart

Ogidi, Anambra and Stratford, England, nearly four thousand three hundred and twenty two miles apart, are the birthplaces of two extremely different authors both culturally and age wise. Although very different, these authors, Chinua Achebe, author of Things Fall Apart, and William Shakespeare, author of Macbeth, both wrote popular stories in which the protagonist's downfall is caused by a common flaw, a misconception of masculinity. To Okonkwo and Macbeth, masculinity equates to power and power equates to success. Okonkwo, the protagonist in Things Fall Apart, vows to be nothing like his effeminate father, Unoka, who Okonkwo resents. In order to be the opposite of his father, Okonkwo works hard to gain power, and he never shows his true …show more content…
Okonkwo and Macbeth spend most of their lives working for their success. Okonkwo devotes his life to working and harvesting yams which symbolizes masculinity and strength. Vowing to be nothing like his father, Okonkwo rules harshly over everyone to exhibit his power. Showcasing his power, he rules his family under strict control. His aggressive power and strict control causes members of his family to turn against him. Nwoye, Okonkwo’s son, resents his father just like Okonkwo resents Unoka. Nwoye is not proud of his father’s hard earned achievements, instead, he is ashamed. He is ashamed that in order to be successful his father would rather be feared than loved, and in turn, Nwoye leaves his family and everything he was raised to know in order to escape his father’s harsh rule. His whole life, Okonkwo strived to become a leader not just within the village but in his family life as well, but “a leader is supported by his followers as long as he does not govern too much” (Uchendu). Unfortunately, Okonkwo governs too much, leaving him with no followers and no power. Just like Okonkwo, Macbeth begins to put his personal achievements in front of everything else. With his constant need to prove his power, Macbeth isolates himself which leads to his downfall. Throughout the play, Shakespeare emphasizes Macbeth’s misinterpretation of masculinity, so that it is evident that “the more Macbeth is driven to pursue what he and Lady Macbeth call manliness-the more he perverts that code into a rationale for reflexive aggression-the less humane he becomes, until at last he forfeits nearly all claims on the race itself, and his vaunted manhood, as he finally realizes, becomes meaningless” (Uchendu). Macbeth realizes that masculinity and power mean