<P> Returning from exile, Okonkwo finds his village changed by the presence of the white men . After a convert commits a heinous act by unmasking an elder as he embodies an ancestral spirit of the clan, the village retaliates by destroying a local Christian church . In return, the leader of the white government takes them prisoner and holds them for a ransom of two hundred cowries for a short while, further humiliating and insulting the native leaders, doing things such as shaving their heads and whipping them . As a result, the people of Umuofia finally gather for what could be a great uprising . Okonkwo, a warrior by nature and adamant about following Umuofian custom and tradition, despises any form of cowardice and advocates war against the white men . When messengers of the white government try to stop the meeting, Okonkwo beheads one of them . Because the crowd allows the other messengers to escape, and does not fight with Okonkwo he realizes with despair that the people of Umuofia are not going to fight to protect themselves--his society's response to such a conflict, which for so long had been predictable and dictated by tradition, is changing . </P> <P> When the local leader of the white government comes to Okonkwo's house to take him to court, he finds that Okonkwo has hanged himself to avoid being tried in a colonial court . Among his own people, Okonkwo's actions have tarnished his reputation and status, as it is strictly against the teachings of the Igbo to commit suicide . </P> <Ul> <Li> Okonkwo is the novel's protagonist . He has three wives and ten (total) children, and is a brave and rash Umuofian (Nigerian) warrior and clan leader . Unlike most, he cares more for his daughter Ezinma than his son Nwoye whom he believes is weak . Okonkwo is the son of the gentle and lazy Unoka, a man he resents for his weaknesses . Okonkwo strives to make his way in a culture that traditionally values manliness . As a young man he defeated the village's best wrestler, earning him lasting prestige . He therefore rejects everything for which he believes his father stood: Unoka was idle, poor, profligate, cowardly, gentle, lazy, and interested in music and conversation . Okonkwo consciously adopts opposite ideals and becomes productive, wealthy, brave, violent, and opposed to music and anything else that he regards as "soft," such as conversation and emotion . He is stoic to a fault . He is also the hardest - working member of his clan . Okonkwo's life is dominated by fear of failure and of weakness--the fear that he will resemble his father . Ironically, in all his efforts not to end up like his father, he commits suicide, becoming in his culture an abomination to the Earth and rebuked by the tribe as his father was (Unoka died from swelling and was likewise considered an abomination). Okonkwo's suicide represents not only his culture's rejection of him, but his rejection of the changes in his people's culture, as he realizes that the Igbo society that he was so proud of has been forever altered by the Christian missionaries . </Li> </Ul> <Li> Okonkwo is the novel's protagonist . He has three wives and ten (total) children, and is a brave and rash Umuofian (Nigerian) warrior and clan leader . Unlike most, he cares more for his daughter Ezinma than his son Nwoye whom he believes is weak . Okonkwo is the son of the gentle and lazy Unoka, a man he resents for his weaknesses . Okonkwo strives to make his way in a culture that traditionally values manliness . As a young man he defeated the village's best wrestler, earning him lasting prestige . He therefore rejects everything for which he believes his father stood: Unoka was idle, poor, profligate, cowardly, gentle, lazy, and interested in music and conversation . Okonkwo consciously adopts opposite ideals and becomes productive, wealthy, brave, violent, and opposed to music and anything else that he regards as "soft," such as conversation and emotion . He is stoic to a fault . He is also the hardest - working member of his clan . Okonkwo's life is dominated by fear of failure and of weakness--the fear that he will resemble his father . Ironically, in all his efforts not to end up like his father, he commits suicide, becoming in his culture an abomination to the Earth and rebuked by the tribe as his father was (Unoka died from swelling and was likewise considered an abomination). Okonkwo's suicide represents not only his culture's rejection of him, but his rejection of the changes in his people's culture, as he realizes that the Igbo society that he was so proud of has been forever altered by the Christian missionaries . </Li>

What is the book things fall apart about