What is the significance of the wrestling matches in ‘Things Fall Apart’?

When analyzing wrestling in the novel, we can look at two distinct questions. How does “Things Fall Apart” use wrestling as a means of exposition (to establish character like Okonkwo)? And what significance does wrestling have for the Igbo people?

In the culture of the Igbo, the wrestling matches connect to the ideas of prowess for an individual and to pride and honor for the individual and the village. “Okonkwo as a young man of eighteen had brought honor to his village by throwing Amalinze the Cat.”

Across the novel, the idea is established that reputation and respect can be earned by doing anything well. Wrestling, for the village, is a special activity, however, because it involves contests against other villages. Intervillage status is at stake in the wrestling matches, weighting these events with special meaning.

Significantly, Okonkwos’ greatest wrestling feat is used to introduce him in the opening passage of the novel. A very physical man, Okonkwo is closely connected to his identity as a wrestler and this connection is in front and in center in the novel’s treatment of his character.

The feat of throwing the Cat does two things in the novel’s introduction. It explains how Okonkwo has come to have some fame and so holds some prominence in the village and demonstrates the idea that Okonkwo is prone to violent action. “Okonkwo’s physical strength, integrity, and courage gives him heroic status, but his pride and individualism contradict the essentially communal nature of Umuofia.”