Okonkwo is almost happy again, despite the fact that his clan did not agree to kill the Christians or drive them away. Even so, he and the rest of the villagers are on their guard, and for the next two days they arm themselves with guns and machetes.

Roaring Flame

Fire Symbol Analysis. Okonkwo and his fellow clansmen liken him to a “Roaring Flame”—aggressive, powerful, and strong-willed. For Okonkwo, these are all positive, masculine traits, and he laments the fact that his son Nwoye doesn’t possess the same fiery spirit.

The last line in the chapter suggests that Okonkwo has an insight: “Living fire begets cold, impotent ash” — perhaps a realization that his own “Roaring Flame” behavior leaves behind coldness and powerlessness in others — as it has in his son.

Okonkwo compares himself to the burning flame, to an active and, at times, violent agent of change, and he acknowledges that after a flame has burned out, all that is left is the “cold impotent ash.” He has produced a son he deems feminine, a son who cannot compare to the brutal masculinity that Okonkwo represents.

Under Reverend Smith’s leadership, a “great conflict between church and clan in Umuofia” gathers and is finally touched off when Enoch unmasks the egwugwu (p. 186). When the elders of the clan eventually burn down the “church which Mr Brown had built” (p.

The other clansmen are afraid, and someone asks, “Why did he do it?” Seeing such inaction and fear, Okonkwo cleans his machete on the sand and walks away, realizing that his fellow Umuofians will never go to war.

You, Unoka, are known in all the clan for the weakness of your machete and your hoe. When your neighbours go out with their axe to cut down virgin forests, you sow your yams on exhausted farms that take no labour to clear.