Intertextuality in Postcolonial African Literature: A Bakhtinian Analysis of Chinua Achebe’s *Things Fall Apart* and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s *Half of a Yellow Sun*

Oral proverbs and folktales in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart function not as static cultural relics but as dialogic intertexts—dynamic, context-dependent carriers of pre-colonial Igbo epistemology that engage in continuous conversation with the novel’s narrative, characters, and ethical dilemmas. To grasp their role, it is first necessary to situate Igbo epistemology as a system rooted in collective wisdom, relational cosmology, and community-centered ethics: knowledge is not an individual possession but a shared heritage transmitted through oral practice, and truth is negotiated through the interplay of ancestral insight and present context. Proverbs and folktales embody this epistemology by encoding generations of lived experience, then entering into dialogue with the novel’s diegesis to guide action, challenge assumptions, and sustain cultural coherence.

Achebe’s integration of proverbs begins with their embedding in everyday speech, where they act as intertextual anchors linking individual choices to collective wisdom. The proverb “When a man says yes, his chi says yes too” appears repeatedly to frame Okonkwo’s pursuit of greatness, yet its meaning shifts through dialogue with his actions, revealing the nuance of Igbo ethical epistemology. For Okonkwo, the proverb initially justifies his relentless ambition: he interprets it as a mandate to assert his will against the shame of his father Unoka’s laziness, believing his chi (personal deity) aligns with his aggressive pursuit of title and respect. However, the novel’s narrative pushes back against this narrow reading: when Okonkwo violates the Week of Peace by beating his wife Ojiugo, the village elder Ezeani invokes the same proverb indirectly, reminding him that “the earth goddess will not sleep in a house where blood is shed” and that his chi’s alignment depends on adherence to communal norms. Here, the proverb operates as a dialogic intertext, mediating between Okonkwo’s individual desire and the collective ethical order—its meaning is not fixed but emerges from the tension between personal interpretation and communal judgment. Another pivotal proverb, “When an old man dies, a library is burned,” encapsulates the Igbo view of knowledge as embodied in ancestral life: elders are not mere authority figures but living repositories of proverbial wisdom, and their passing threatens the continuity of epistemological heritage. Achebe weaves this proverb into the novel’s emotional core when Okonkwo attends the funeral of Ezeudu, the village’s oldest and most respected elder. As the cannon salute accidentally kills Ezeudu’s son, the proverb resonates beyond its literal meaning: it foreshadows not just the loss of an individual elder but the impending erosion of the entire “library” of pre-colonial Igbo knowledge under colonialism. Yet in the novel’s pre-colonial sections, the proverb’s dialogic force lies in its reminder that knowledge is not lost but reanimated through oral transmission—when younger villagers repeat the proverb after Ezeudu’s death, they engage in a dialogue with the past, reaffirming their commitment to preserving the collective wisdom it represents.

Folktales, too, act as dialogic intertexts, embedding Igbo cosmological and ethical epistemology into the novel’s plot through metaphor and narrative resonance. The tale of “Tortoise and the Birds,” recounted by Ekwefi to her daughter Ezinma during a sleepless night, is a quintessential example: it tells of Tortoise, who tricks the birds into granting him the name “All of You” so he can hoard a feast in the sky, only to fall and shatter his shell when the birds retaliate. On the surface, the tale is a children’s story, but its dialogic interplay with the novel’s themes reveals deeper layers of Igbo epistemology. The tale encodes the community’s rejection of individual greed—Tortoise’s downfall stems from his refusal to honor the collective agreement that “all of you” should share the feast, a violation of the Igbo principle that wealth and resources belong to the community. This theme reverberates throughout the novel: Okonkwo’s obsession with personal achievement mirrors Tortoise’s greed, and his eventual alienation from the village (after killing Ikemefuna against the Oracle’s implicit warning) echoes Tortoise’s exile from the sky. Yet the tale’s dialogic power lies in its refusal to reduce ethics to a simple moral; instead, it invites reflection on the consequences of disrupting relational harmony, a reflection that Ekwefi and Ezinma engage in as they discuss the tale. Ezinma’s question—“Why did Tortoise have to lie?”—is not a request for a fixed answer but an invitation to dialogue, through which mother and daughter negotiate the meaning of honesty and community in their own lives.

Crucially, neither proverbs nor folktales present a monolithic Igbo identity; instead, their dialogic nature reveals the internal diversity of pre-colonial Igbo epistemology. For instance, the proverb “A man who pays respect to the great paves the way for his own greatness” is invoked by Okonkwo to justify his deference to village elders, but it is challenged by the younger generation’s quiet skepticism—when Nwoye listens to the proverb and then watches Okonkwo beat Ojiugo, he feels a dissonance between the proverb’s ideal of respect and the violence it masks. This dissonance is not a flaw in the proverb but a testament to its dialogic function: it invites critical engagement, allowing the community to negotiate values rather than enforce them rigidly. Similarly, the tale of “Tortoise and the Birds” is retold in slightly different versions by different villagers, each emphasizing a different moral (some focus on trickery, others on collective responsibility), reflecting the pluralism of Igbo epistemology.

In the novel’s pre-colonial sections, these dialogic intertexts play a foundational role in sustaining cultural主体性 (subjectivity). They do not exist in isolation but are woven into the fabric of daily life, guiding conflict resolution, shaping parental advice, and framing communal decision-making. When the village council debates whether to go to war with the Mbaino, elders invoke proverbs like “He who brings kola brings life” to emphasize the importance of negotiation before violence, and the council’s decision to accept five youths (including Ikemefuna) as compensation emerges from this dialogic engagement with proverbial wisdom. In this way, proverbs and folktales are not passive symbols but active agents in the construction of Igbo cultural identity—they enable the community to articulate its values, resolve internal tensions, and maintain a sense of continuity across generations.

By framing oral proverbs and folktales as dialogic intertexts, Achebe resists the colonial tendency to reduce pre-colonial African cultures to static, primitive “traditions.” Instead, he shows that Igbo oral practice is a dynamic epistemological system, one where meaning is constantly negotiated through dialogue between the past and the present, the individual and the community. In the face of impending colonialism, these intertexts are not just reminders of what is lost but testaments to what was: a culture with its own robust, pluralistic way of knowing, one that sustained its主体性 through the very act of dialogic exchange.

To unpack the role of colonial missionary and administrative texts as monologic foils in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, we first ground the analysis in Mikhail Bakhtin’s theoretical distinction between monologic and dialogic discourse: monologic discourse claims singular, unassailable truth, silencing alternative perspectives by framing itself as the definitive representation of reality, while dialogic discourse thrives on the interplay of competing voices, recognizing no inherent hierarchy of truth. Achebe positions colonial missionary and administrative texts as paradigmatic monologic constructs—vehicles of ideological hegemony that seek to erase Igbo cultural autonomy by presenting colonial “civilization” as the only valid framework for understanding society. Through strategic parody, Achebe subverts the authority of these texts, exposing their internal contradictions and cultural violence, and in doing so, carves out a dialogic space where Igbo voices can counter the colonial monologue.

Missionary texts, such as the diary entries and oral accounts of Mr. Brown and Mr. Smith, emerge as monologic artifacts that distort Igbo religious and social life to justify missionary intervention. Mr. Brown, the initial missionary in Umuofia, frames his diary entries as objective observations of “primitive” Igbo practices, but Achebe infuses these accounts with parodic undertones that reveal their interpretive bias. For instance, Mr. Brown’s description of the Igbo oracle of Agbala as a “false idol” and the practice of offering kola nuts to ancestors as “superstitious ritual” is parodied through the novel’s third-person narrative, which contextualizes these practices as integral to Igbo communal cohesion. When Mr. Brown recounts his first encounter with an Igbo elder who explains that Agbala is the “voice of the ancestors,” the missionary’s diary reduces this explanation to a “rambling tale of spirits,” a parodic simplification that exposes how missionary texts erase the nuance of Igbo spiritual epistemology. This parody is amplified by Mr. Smith, who succeeds Mr. Brown and adopts a more aggressive stance: his sermons frame Igbo religion as “devil worship” and his diary entries depict Igbo resistance as “satanic rebellion.” Achebe parodies Smith’s rigidity by juxtaposing his fiery denunciations with scenes of Igbo villagers peacefully debating the merits of Christianity—for example, when Nwoye is drawn to Christianity not by Smith’s threats, but by his own confusion about Igbo customs (such as the killing of twins), the missionary’s claim that his sermons “converted the heathen” is revealed as a self-serving fiction. By highlighting the gap between the missionary’s monologic claims of “truth” and the lived reality of Igbo life, Achebe deconstructs the authority of missionary texts, showing them to be tools of cultural erasure rather than spiritual guidance.

Administrative texts, including colonial officials’ reports and legal decrees, similarly function as monologic foils, framing colonial rule as a benevolent “civilizing mission” while masking its violent imposition of power. The District Commissioner’s reports are a case in point: in his account of the colonial court’s establishment in Umuofia, he describes the court as a “forum for justice” that replaces the “arbitrary rule” of Igbo elders. Achebe parodies this claim through the scene of Okonkwo’s son, Nwoye, observing a colonial court trial where an Igbo man is convicted of “assaulting a white man” based on flimsy evidence. The District Commissioner’s report frames the trial as “upholding the rule of law,” but the novel’s narrative reveals that the court’s interpreter deliberately mistranslates the Igbo defendant’s testimony, reducing his explanation of a land dispute to a “confession of guilt.” This parodic disjuncture between the report’s monologic assertion of fairness and the trial’s actual injustice exposes administrative texts as vehicles of cultural violence—they legitimate colonial power by redefining Igbo legal practices as “uncivilized” and colonial law as the only valid system. The pinnacle of this parody occurs in the District Commissioner’s plan for his book, The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of the Lower Niger, where he intends to reduce Okonkwo’s tragic suicide to a “brief chapter” titled “The Pacification of the Umuofia Clans.” This trivialization of Okonkwo’s life—his struggle to uphold Igbo honor, his resistance to colonialism—parodies the administrative text’s monologic urge to flatten complex human experiences into a narrative of colonial success. Achebe’s portrayal of this plan reveals how administrative texts erase the humanity of colonized peoples, framing their resistance as a “problem” to be “pacified” rather than a legitimate response to oppression.

The trial of Okonkwo’s close friend, Obierika, further illustrates how Achebe uses parody to subvert administrative monologism. When Obierika is summoned to the colonial court for “inciting rebellion” after he criticizes the District Commissioner’s arbitrary arrest of Igbo elders, the court’s proceedings are parodied through the absurdity of the colonial legal framework. The District Commissioner, who has no knowledge of Igbo land tenure systems, dismisses Obierika’s explanation of the elders’ arrest as a “misunderstanding” and sentences him to a fine, claiming that the fine is a “lenient punishment” to “teach him respect for British law.” Achebe parodies the commissioner’s claim of leniency by showing that the fine is exorbitant—equivalent to several months of an Igbo farmer’s income—and that the court’s decision is based on no legal precedent, only the commissioner’s whims. This parody exposes administrative texts as instruments of economic exploitation, masking colonial greed behind the rhetoric of “civilization.”

Through these parodic interventions, Achebe transforms colonial monologic texts into foils that highlight the validity of Igbo cultural voices. The missionary’s distorted accounts of Igbo religion, the administrative reports’ false claims of justice—all are parodied to reveal their status as contingent, ideologically loaded narratives rather than objective truths. In this way, Achebe constructs a dialogic space where Igbo perspectives can challenge the colonial monologue: the novel’s third-person narrative, which centers Igbo experiences and explains the logic behind their customs, stands in counterpoint to the colonial texts’ monologic claims, inviting readers to recognize the complexity and legitimacy of Igbo culture. The parody of colonial texts thus serves as a critical intertextual strategy, deconstructing colonial authority and affirming the possibility of a post-colonial dialogue where multiple voices can coexist on equal terms. As Bakhtin argues, dialogic discourse emerges when monologic claims to truth are dismantled, and Achebe’s parody of colonial texts does precisely that—opening up a space for Igbo voices to be heard, not as “primitive” alternatives to colonial “civilization,” but as valid, vital contributions to the global conversation about culture and power.

Intertextual echoes of the Western literary canon in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart are not passive allusions but deliberate acts of recontextualization, through which the author reframes the European-centric tragedy tradition to center African subjectivity. To grasp this reworking, one must first recognize that Western tragedy—rooted in Greek dramas like Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex and Shakespearean works such as Hamlet—typically hinges on a noble protagonist’s tragic flaw (hamartia) that triggers a downward spiral, often intertwined with the illusion of inescapable fate. Achebe appropriates these structural elements but transplants them into the soil of Igbo cultural epistemology, dismantling the European framing of African societies as “pre-tragic” or devoid of complex moral agency.

Okonkwo, the novel’s central figure, embodies this recontextualized tragic hero. Like Greek tragic protagonists such as Oedipus, Okonkwo is defined by a consuming obsession that becomes his undoing: his fear of resembling his father Unoka, a man dismissed by Umuofia for his laziness and inability to uphold communal honor. This fear manifests as a rigid pursuit of “manliness” (chi na edere mma) as defined by Igbo norms—courage in battle, success in yam farming, and uncompromising adherence to ancestral customs. Here, Achebe diverges from the Western tragic flaw: whereas Oedipus’ hamartia is a intellectual blindness to his own identity, Okonkwo’s flaw is not an inherent moral defect but a misalignment with the fluidity of Igbo communal values. For instance, when he participates in the killing of Ikemefuna—a boy he has raised as a son—he acts to avoid being labeled “weak,” even though the village elder Ezeudu warns him against it. This choice, driven by his fear of dishonor, mirrors the Greek hero’s fatal decision, but its motivation is rooted in Igbo concepts of communal reputation rather than abstract individual hubris. Unlike Shakespeare’s Macbeth, whose ambition is self-serving and transgresses monarchical order, Okonkwo’s ambition is tied to his desire to validate his place within Umuofia; his tragedy emerges not from a violation of universal moral laws but from a failure to adapt to the shifting dynamics of his community as colonial forces encroach.

Achebe further recontextualizes the Western theme of “inescapable fate” by replacing the divine or cosmic determinism of Greek tragedy with the interplay of Igbo cultural cosmology and colonial intervention. In Greek tragedy, fate is a force beyond human control—Oedipus cannot escape the prophecy of patricide and incest no matter how hard he tries. For Okonkwo, however, “fate” is not a preordained cosmic plan but the collision between his rigid adherence to traditional values and the irreversible disruption of colonialism. The novel’s title, Things Fall Apart, echoes W.B. Yeats’ poem “The Second Coming”—a work that laments the collapse of European order—but Achebe repurposes this imagery to describe the disintegration of Igbo society under colonial rule. Okonkwo’s suicide, the tragic climax, is a deliberate subversion of Western tragic endings: whereas Oedipus blinds himself to atone for his sins, Okonkwo hangs himself because he can no longer bear to see his community betray its ancestral ways by collaborating with the colonizers. In Igbo culture, suicide is an abomination that renders the body unburialable, yet Achebe frames this act not as a sign of cowardice but as a final assertion of Okonkwo’s commitment to his cultural identity—a rejection of the colonial “civilization” that has stripped Umuofia of its autonomy.

This recontextualization serves a critical purpose: it challenges the Western literary canon’s “othering” of Africa as a space of primitivism and moral vacuity. For centuries, Western texts—from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness to Shakespeare’s The Tempest—portrayed Africans as either savages or innocents, devoid of the complex psychological and moral dimensions that define Western tragic heroes. Achebe’s use of Western tragic structures to depict Okonkwo’s struggle demonstrates that African societies have their own rich traditions of moral inquiry and tragic narrative, undermining the European claim to cultural superiority. For example, the novel’s portrayal of the Igbo judicial system—where elders resolve conflicts through communal dialogue—contrasts with the colonial administration’s arbitrary use of power, such as the District Commissioner’s decision to imprison Okonkwo and other village leaders without trial. By framing Okonkwo’s tragedy as a product of both his personal flaw and colonial oppression, Achebe shows that African subjectivity is shaped by both individual agency and historical forces, just as Western subjectivity is.

The novel’s ending further subverts the “civilized” vs. “barbaric” binary that underpins Western colonial discourse. The District Commissioner, in his memoir The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of the Lower Niger, plans to devote a single paragraph to Okonkwo’s story, dismissing his suicide as a “senseless act of savagery.” This moment is a meta-commentary on how Western texts erase African agency: the Commissioner reduces Okonkwo’s tragic struggle to a footnote in his narrative of colonial “progress.” Achebe, however, centers Okonkwo’s perspective throughout the novel, allowing readers to understand the complexity of his choices and the tragedy of his demise. In doing so, he reverses the gaze: the “barbaric” label is not applied to Okonkwo but to the colonial powers that destroy a vibrant culture in the name of “civilization.”

In sum, Achebe’s intertextual engagement with the Western literary canon in Things Fall Apart is a radical act of decolonization. By recontextualizing Western tragic elements within Igbo cultural frameworks, he constructs a tragedy that centers African subjectivity, critiques the “othering” of Africa in Western literature, and asserts the validity of Igbo cultural traditions. Okonkwo’s story is not a mere imitation of Western tragedy but a distinctively African tragedy—one that speaks to the universal human experience of loss and resistance while honoring the specificities of Igbo identity. Through this reworking, Achebe proves that African literature can engage with Western traditions without being subsumed by them, paving the way for future postcolonial writers to claim their place in the global literary canon.

Polyphonic intertextuality, as conceptualized by Mikhail Bakhtin, refers to a narrative structure where multiple independent, ideologically distinct voices coexist without being subordinated to a single authoritative “authorial voice.” In Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun, this Bakhtinian principle is operationalized through the interweaving of three primary character perspectives—Ugwu, Olanna, and Richard—each of whom articulates a unique relationship to the Biafran War (1967–1970), gendered experience, and the trauma of post-independence Nigeria. Unlike a monologic text, where the narrator’s perspective frames all events, Adichie’s polyphony allows each voice to retain its autonomy, inviting readers to engage with the war not as a singular historical event but as a mosaic of subjective truths. This structure is critical to the novel’s postcolonial project, as it challenges the homogenizing narratives of both colonial powers and post-independence nation-states, which often erase the granular, lived experiences of marginalized groups.

The intertextual layers of Half of a Yellow Sun are rooted in the characters’ engagement with pre-colonial, colonial, and contemporary cultural and historical texts, which shape their understanding of self and conflict. Ugwu, a young houseboy from a rural Igbo village, enters the narrative with a worldview forged by oral traditions—his mother’s folktales of ancestral spirits and communal solidarity—yet his perspective evolves as he encounters Western education through his employer, Odenigbo, a radical university professor. Odenigbo’s library, filled with texts by Frantz Fanon, Karl Marx, and Chinua Achebe, becomes a site of intertextual collision: Ugwu’s oral heritage collides with anti-colonial theory, leading him to frame the Biafran cause as a continuation of the Igbo struggle against external domination. His later role as a witness to the war’s atrocities—including the starvation of children in refugee camps—transforms his voice from that of a naive observer to a chronicler of trauma, his memoirs (titled The World Was Silent When We Died) serving as an intertextual counter to the silences of global media, which largely ignored the Biafran genocide.

Olanna, Odenigbo’s partner and a university lecturer, embodies a gendered voice that intersects with the politics of class and nationhood. Her perspective is shaped by intertexts of feminist resistance and postcolonial elite identity: she rejects the patriarchal norms of her wealthy family (who prioritize arranged marriages and female submission) while aligning herself with Odenigbo’s Biafran nationalist movement. Yet her gendered experience of the war—including the rape she endures at the hands of Nigerian soldiers—exposes the limits of nationalist discourse, which often frames “liberation” as a male-centric project. Olanna’s voice intertextually engages with the unspoken narratives of women in war: her trauma is not just a personal wound but a reflection of the gendered violence that is erased from official war histories. Unlike male nationalists who focus on territorial sovereignty, Olanna’s priority shifts to protecting her family and community, a perspective that challenges the hierarchy of “important” war experiences.

Richard, a British expat and aspiring writer, offers a third polyphonic voice, one shaped by colonial guilt and the desire to “authenticate” African culture. His obsession with the “degenerate art” of the Nsukka School—spearheaded by Odenigbo and his colleagues—leads him to write a book about pre-colonial Igbo uli art, yet his perspective is complicated by his relationship with Kainene, Olanna’s twin sister, who is a sharp critic of Western appropriation. Richard’s intertextual engagement with colonial ethnographies (such as those by Mary Kingsley) and postcolonial theory creates a tension: he wants to amplify Igbo voices, but his status as a white outsider makes him a partial, often flawed, mediator. His trauma—rooted in his inability to protect Kainene, who disappears during the war’s final days—exposes the limits of Western empathy, as his grief is intertwined with his guilt over his complicity in colonial structures.

The polyphonic intertextuality of Half of a Yellow Sun reaches its apex in the way these voices collide and converse without resolution. For example, when Olanna and Richard debate the legitimacy of the Biafran cause, their disagreement is not resolved by the narrative; instead, their voices remain in tension, reflecting the ideological divides that fueled the war. Similarly, Ugwu’s memoirs, which he writes decades after the war, do not “solve” the trauma of Biafra but rather add another layer to the intertextual tapestry, connecting the past to the present. This lack of resolution is a deliberate Bakhtinian choice: it mirrors the ongoing nature of post-colonial trauma, which cannot be neatly wrapped up in a narrative arc.

In practical terms, Adichie’s polyphonic intertextuality serves a critical postcolonial function: it decenters the Western gaze by prioritizing African voices, while also avoiding the trap of homogenizing African experience. By giving equal weight to Ugwu’s rural perspective, Olanna’s feminist-nationalist identity, and Richard’s conflicted outsider status, the novel demonstrates that post-colonial trauma is not a monolith but a collection of intersecting experiences. This structure also challenges readers to confront their own biases: by engaging with multiple autonomous voices, readers are forced to question their assumptions about war, gender, and nationhood, rather than passively accepting a single “truth.”

In conclusion, Half of a Yellow Sun’s polyphonic intertextuality is not merely a narrative technique but a political and ethical tool. It operationalizes Bakhtin’s theory to give voice to those marginalized by historical and literary narratives, while also exploring the complex ways in which intertexts—oral traditions, anti-colonial theory, colonial ethnographies—shape our understanding of conflict and trauma. Adichie’s novel thus stands as a testament to the power of polyphony in postcolonial literature: it allows us to see the war not as a distant event, but as a living, breathing mosaic of human experience.