This document provides context for Chinua Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart. It discusses Achebe's life and background growing up in Nigeria with one foot in traditional Igbo culture and another in the English educational system. It outlines the colonial history of Africa in the 19th century when European powers divided and conquered the continent. It also summarizes post-colonial theory, which examines the effects of colonial rule, and the literary context for Things Fall Apart as one of the first novels to incorporate traditional African elements into the Western novel form.