If you're like most American high school students, you don't know much about the context of the novel we're going to read. Things Fall Apartis a novel written by a Nigerian. The novel's characters are also Nigerian, specifically Igbo, and they lived in the late 1800s. Obviously, before you enter the world of this book and try to make connections with its ideas, you need to know more about its context. Who wrote it and why? Where did it happen? When did it happen? What are the people like? What is the time period like? In other words, before you think about this book's ideas, you must consider its historical, geographical, social, and cultural contexts.