Dead Man's Path

Do you believe in the supernatural? The short story “Dead Man’s Path” written by Chinua Achebe might make you think twice. This story is full of bizarre happenings. This little tale is not like most ghost stories. The main character is very well developed.

Michael Obi is known to his students and colleges as Mr. Obi. Mr. Obi gets promoted to be headmaster at a school he has never worked at before. The school is Ndume Central. He knows very little about this school and its spiritual back round. Michael was very ambitious, he wanted to put a lot of energy into the school. Some strange things started to occur when Mr. Obi had his school up and running.

Little did Michael know, the school was built next to an Indian burial ground. Unnatural events started to happen at the school. One day Mr. Obi was looking outside at his gardens in the front of his school, and he saw a very strange woman walking around in his gardens. Michael didn’t know how that was possible since he had a fence with barbed wire around the school. A couple days later since Obi kept seeing random people in the path that leads to the burial ground, he blocked the path with logs and other items he could find. The Villagers were mad because that’s where their ancestors laid. A day later a priest came to talk to Michael about removing the logs that were blocking the path. Michael was too stubborn. Two days later a woman died while trying to give birth.

The Main theme of this story is tradition. The people believed that the burial site was a peaceful place were their dead loved ones laid. Villagers could also communicate to them and, this is also were their children were born. Obi disagreed, he said woman gave birth to children. After what happened he might have thought twice about what he said to the priest.

Overall “Dead Man’s Path” is a very well written story. Some people don’t believe in ghosts and the supernatural but, after you read this short story your more than likely to change your mind. Mr. Obi had an adventure throughout the story. He wanted the best for the school, but in the end he went against what the priest asked and everything went downhill. A lesson from this story is don’t take away peoples beliefs.