Dead Men’s Path
Chinua Achebe’s “Dead Man’s Path” presents the saga of Michael Obi, a newly appointed energetic youthful teacher who was being charged with the responsibility of reforming Ndume Central school that is on the brink of virtual collapse and decay owing to gross mismanagement and inefficiencies.
Obi is glowing with enthusiasm about the prospects of being able to turn the school into a modern class centre of learning.
This ambitious plan is shared by his youthful wife of two years of marriage. Among the first reforms headmaster Obi has put in place is to embark on the physical beautification of the school premises with horticultural works. Mr. Obi is so obsessed with his policies that he pays little regard for the long held traditions of the native people whose children he is responsible for imparting the tenets of formal western education values. The garden he and his wife recently planted cuts across an old ancient footpath used by the natives. His attention is drawn to this supposed oversight by the village fetish priest to what he considers to be a blatant sacrilegious act on the part of this newly posted head teacher.
The discourse that ensued between the village fetish priest and Mr. Obi proves that the former treated the superstitious claims of the priest with utter scorn. For instance when queried by the fetish priest he said “we cannot allow people to make a highway of our school compound.” Furthermore, the following quotation, “the whole purpose of our school is to eradicate just such beliefs as that. Dead men do not require footpaths. The whole idea is just fantastic. Our duty is to teach your children to laugh at such ideas,” serves as an outright presentation of his mission statement to the native folks (Achebe 1953). In an unusually conciliatory tone the fetish priest concludes his meeting with the admonishment that Mr. Obi should “let the hawk perch and let the eagle perch.” In order words there was no point seeking to claim superiority and dominance of one belief over the other. All that was needed is for both parties to peacefully coexist irrespective of their inherent ideological differences. Essentially, in the story Dead Mens Path, Chinua Achebe infers that a person’s values can be swayed, while a culture cannot.
As the story progresses it becomes evident that Mr. Obi discovers that his conservative stance of ignoring the fetish beliefs of the natives places him in a threatening conflict position with the native folks. What is true is that whatever a people consider to be admirable or dreadful, beautiful or ugly, bright or stupid is firmly tied to the values system prevailing that society, it is in the light of this Chenua Achebe has conspicuously chosen tradition to be the major theme of his story. Viewed from both sides
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