Things Fall Apart: Chapters 15,16 "The Iron Hourse"

Things Fall Apart: Chapters 15,16 “The Iron Horse”

"He was not an albino. He was quite different." He sipped his wine. "And he was riding an iron horse. The first people who saw him ran away, but he stood beckoning to them. In the end the fearless ones went near and even touched him. The elders consulted their Oracle and it told them that the strange man would break their clan and spread destruction among them." (Achebe 135).

Racial suspicions, that is to say, dislike of people who looked different, play a major role in conflict. The villagers were afraid of the white man and his “iron horse,” which turned out to be harmless, and this fear caused them to murder the man, which in turn led to the destruction of the entire Abame village. This reveals how, during the 1890s, imperialism was encouraged by a sense of cultural superiority. The Abame people did not necessarily view themselves as superior, but their suspicion of the white man caused strife, which gave the imperialists what they considered furthermore reason to take land. This is especially evident in Okonkwo’s violent and hasty mindset toward killing the white men. By no means is this entire encounter the fault of the Abame people--however, there is evidently a sense of cultural superiority on both sides, which breeds violence between the two and facilitates imperialism.