In order to resist the missionaries, Okonkwo kills one of the leaders with a machete, expecting the others to join his resistance. They do not, and suddenly Okonkwo realizes his clansmen are not willing to join him in war. Okonkwo soon hangs himself to death.
As you can see, many of Okonkwo's actions are directly influenced by his need to resist his father's ideals. Driven to violence many times, he realizes that he has not changed while the rest of the world has, and so he kills himself in anger and grief because of his realization that he is wrong. Being wrong is a terrible realization to many people. Believing that they know what is right their whole life, they are thrust into a life of accusations from others and hatred which they had never known. Okonkwo's intense hatred of his father pushed him to the brink of opposition, denying everything his father stood for to lead a life of loneliness, hatred, and grief. Okonkwo's life and death follow the mold of a tragic hero.
Though Okonkwo tried to live his life the best way he knew how, his life was indeed full of hatred for his father. This hatred was what led to his downfall, his tragic flaw if you will. "Turning and turning in the widening gyre, the falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world." This quote from a poem by William Yeats is the preface to Things Fall Apart. This shows the pattern by which Okonkwo's world is torn apart. Spinning in a never ending funnel, the servant cannot hear its master, referring to God's word not being heard by the people of the world. Things being destroyed, everything holding everything else up falls apart, and chaos reigns. This is similar to Okonkwo's life. Okonkwo is constantly unable to communicate his emotions with anyone and his mixture of obsession with being manly and his aggressive and courageous nature make for a bad combination.
