Igbo Cosmology in Chinua Achebe’s Arrow of God: An Evaluative Analysis

Abstract

The death, burial, and funeral of African literary icon professor Chinua Achebe (1930-2013) and the fifty years anniversary of the publication of Arrow of God (AG) have led to fresh interest in the works and times of this great African literary giant. Though many books and journal articles have already been written on various themes of his work, one must not forget that Achebe wrote most of his fictional novels from Igbo traditional background. Our interest in the present endeavour is to investigate how Arrow of God recreated the Igbo traditional cosmology in various plots and characters in the novel, as well as how relevant these are to the contemporary Igbo and black Africa in general. Our methodology lies in the thematic discussion and interpretation of the plots and characters in the novel. The study is concluded on the note that Achebe exposed inevitable consequences of the situation when those in position of power and authority forget the derivative source of their power (the people) and rather cling to individual and personal aggrandizement. This will definitely bring them down from grace to grass like the chief priest of Ulu deity in Arrow of God. The novel also reveals that there is indeed a great repository of oral pre-literate tradition which our forebears have left behind for us to transmit to the coming generation as well as us as moral-social pedestal and foundation for engineering new paradigm structures for internally motivated African development.