Things Fall Apart (African Trilogy, Book 1)
<p><b>“A true classic of world literature . . . A masterpiece that has inspired generations of writers in Nigeria, across Africa, and around the world.” <b>—</b>Barack Obama <br /><br />“African literature is incomplete and unthinkable without the works of Chinua Achebe.” —Toni Morrison<br /><br />Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s <i>The Great American Read</i></b><i><br /><br />Things Fall Apart</i> is the first of three novels in Chinua Achebe's critically acclaimed African Trilogy. It is a classic narrative about Africa's cataclysmic encounter with Europe as it establishes a colonial presence on the continent. Told through the fictional experiences of Okonkwo, a wealthy and fearless Igbo warrior of Umuofia in the late 1800s, <i>Things Fall Apart </i>explores one man's futile resistance to the devaluing of his Igbo traditions by British political andreligious forces and his despair as his community capitulates to the powerful new order.<br /><br /> With more than 20 million copies sold and translated into fifty-seven languages, <i>Things Fall Apart </i>provides one of the most illuminating and permanent monuments to African experience. Achebe does not only capture life in a pre-colonial African village, he conveys the tragedy of the loss of that world while broadening our understanding of our contemporary realities.</p>