ASSIGNMENT- THE DEAD MAN'S PATH

"Dead man's path" by Chinua Achebe is about a young and energetic teacher called Mikael obi and how this young bud is appointed as the principle of an unprogressive school and how exicited he and his wife were about this new door that had opened to them about all their dreams coming true all their desire's being fulfilled and how after becoming principle he blocked a sacred path of the villagers which was going through the school and how he refused to reopen it even when he was requested by the village priest indirectly chalenging the religious beliefs of the villagers .and making a mockery of their beliefs and how the villagers get back at him by bringing down the school with all its pomp and beauty the very same day the supervisor came to visit the school and wrote a report criticizing obi and his abilities to run the school

In this story obi a young man is given the opportunity to run the Ndume central school as principle he and his wife were extemely excited about this new chance he was blessed with Mikael possessed a secondary school education which put him ahead of many other teachers he also had many ideas which were bursting to come out and now finally his chance was here he was principle of school which indeed was backward but he would definately take the school way ahead atleast thats what he and his wife thought his wife was as excited regarding her husbands promotion and she had a certain pride that she would be the queen of her kingdom though it wasnt a huge empire .she wasnt too happy to know that there would be all young teachers working under Obi but this very fact gave Obi a certain pleasure as he could see them giving more time and energy into his two basic wants one was too give the school a high standard of teaching and the other was too make the school compound a beautiful garden and he completed the later with the help of his wife .
one day a lady passed across a certain foothpath which connected the village church shrine and the burial place as she walked she trampled on some of the flowers and destroyed them thats when obi approached a teacher and asked him as to why that path which was passing through the school compound was not shutdown thats when he realized that that very path was sacred but still he shut the path down even when the village priest requested him he poked fun at the priest for his beliefs and thought in a modern way and refused to reopen the path. Due to the death of a women in the village a diviner was called and he prescribed a heavy sacrifice for the the fence put up by Obi
the very next day the entire fence of the school was broken down one of the building wings was bought down and Mikael could not do anything and to his badluck that very dreadful day the supervisor had come to inspect the school

Obi's modern thinking led him to fight against religion superstitions and false beliefs and see were that took him he bought upon himself the mighty wrath of god. For him his pride and ego and modern thinking which was his strongest weapon backfired on himself he lost evrything just attempting to save his dreams he felt tat such things of a path for the dead is something foolish and that it was just mere superstition but his stubborn attitude led him to downfall
This story basically tells us the religion forms the basis of our lifes nothing can challenge religion and all the beliefs that go with it







AARON VERDES
ROLLNO 38