...In his tremendously bold and thought-provoking novel ‘The Kite Runner’, Khaled Hossieni leads his audience down the path of a young boy growing up in Afghanistan and his road to find redemption. At the beginning of the novel, we find a grown man named Amir, still struggling to overcome his ‘shameful past’ of sins, lying and betrayal. As we are transported into the world of Amir in his home town of Kabul in North-East Afghanistan, we experience his life story; from early childhood, where he flew kites daily with his Hazara friend Hassan, to his adulthood in America where he struggled to live in the poor conditions with his ill father. Amir’s wrong-doings back in his childhood forever haunt him and the secrets of his past drive him to seek redemption and endeavor to find amends for his sins. Amir’s childhood consisted of mockery and disloyalty to Hassan. Even after moving away to America with his father, Amir finds it difficult and cannot bury his guilt. Amir’s return to Afghanistan in order to ‘be good again’, is a mere act of selfishness as his only motivation for returning was to relieve himself of the remorse that he felt for many years. In the beginning, Amir and Hassan’s friendship seems unbinding and they are practically inseparable. Whether flying kites out in the streets or reading books by the pomegranate tree, the two young Afghani boys did everything together. Hassan’s unyielding loyalty and willingness to serve Amir is truly astonishing and yet Amir tends never to...
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...The Influence of the Past The past will forever be a part of the present, it affects who we become and how we live our lives. Depending on a specific past, future lives can be affected positively or negatively. In the novel The Kite Runner Baba, Amir and Hassan all had violent pasts which negatively impacted their future and how they viewed themselves and their lives. There was a point in each of their lives where their childhood ended with just one event. Amir watched his friend/brother get raped for the wellbeing of himself, Hassan’s mother left him when he was born mainly because of his appearance, and Baba and Amir lost a wife and mother at the time Amir was born. All these events attributed to a problematic childhood and future. Having a difficult past can limit how you perceive yourself, how you perceive others and how you look at life as a whole. In these following paragraphs I will discuss in detail about Hassan, Baba’s and Amir’s lives including specifics as to how their lives are different due to their intense emotional pasts. Facing rejection can be hard enough as is, however when the rejection comes from the one woman who brought you into this world, that’s when the real damage sets in. Hassan was merely a newborn boy when his mother rejected him the first time, for something so small, and for something he couldn’t control. After Sanaubar had given birth, she took “one glance at the baby in Ali's arms, [saw] the cleft lip, and barked a bitter laughter. [...]. She...
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...Khaled Hosseini worked as a medical internist at Kaiser Hospital in Mountain View, California for several years before publishing The Kite Runner.[3][6][7] In 1999, he learned through a news report that the Taliban had banned kite flying in Afghanistan,[8] a restriction he found particularly cruel.[9] The news "struck a personal chord" for him, as he had grown up with the sport while living in Afghanistan. He was motivated to write a 25-page short story about two boys who fly kites in Kabul.[8] Hosseini submitted copies to Esquire and The New Yorker, both of which rejected it.[9] He rediscovered the manuscript in his garage in March 2001 and began to expand it to novel format at the suggestion of a friend.[8][9] According to Hosseini, the narrative became "much darker" than he originally intended.[8] His editor, Cindy Spiegel, "helped him rework the last third of his manuscript", something she describes as relatively common for a first novel.[9] As with Hosseini's subsequent novels, The Kite Runner covers a multigenerational period and focuses on the relationship between parents and their children.[2] The latter was unintentional; Hosseini developed an interest in the theme while in the process of writing.[2] He later divulged that he frequently came up with pieces of the plot by drawing pictures of it.[7] For example, he did not decide to make Amir and Hassan brothers until after he had "doodled it".[7] Like Amir, the protagonist of the novel, Hosseini was born in Afghanistan...
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...what happens you can always redeem yourself. This statement is especially true for the novel “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini. In the novel the main character is a Pashtun boy named Amir who is the son of a wealthy father and a Hazara boy named Hassan who is the son of a poor father. Hassan and his father Ali are the servents to Hassan and his father Baba located in Afghanastan. In a land where reputation is like a gun which is aimed at you at all times Amir is constantly reminded of how poorly Hazara’s are treated throughout the novel. Amir and Hassan are no exception to the problems in Afghan society and this is seen through Amir’s treatment and jeasolousy of Hassan. Throughout the entire novel all Amir wanted was his fathers love and attenetion but he realized that he had to constantly live up to his fathers expectations in order to gain it. Amir wants to be the only person in his fathers life but instead he has to share the spotlight with Hassan as well who Amir claims is just a “Hazara boy”. Amir feels guilty in many situations because Hassan always takes the blame for Amir’s actions and always shows love and dedication to Amir even in the face of danger. One such incident where Hassan was in the face of danger and even death was right after Amir and Hassan won the kite fighting championship. Hassan being Amirs servent decides to “run the kite” which means to get the kite that was cut and return it to Amir so that he can show his father. Amir at this point of the novel...
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...The Roles Portrayed, by Women in Afghan Culture Identifying the roles of women in Afghan culture reveals the degrading attitude society displays. In Khaled Hosseni’s novel The Kite Runner there are various occasions when the roles of women are inferior in Afghan culture. Therefore it can be concluded the women of Afghanistan play degrading roles in Afghan culture because they are mistreated and exploited. By examining the roles of Soraya, Jamila, and Sanaubar, when these women are controlled in their decisions it will be shown that they are indeed mistreated by society’s expectations. The culture of Afghanistan is male-dominated and the women are inferior to the men of Afghan culture. The women’s roles in Afghan culture are to obey the men, stay home and be a housewife. As well as cater to the needs of their husbands. Society is simply people in general, livening together in communities. The role of women in Afghan culture is ridiculed through the characters of Sanaubar and Soraya. The women of Afghan don’t have much of a choice when it comes to their marriage. Most women have arranged marriages, sometimes these men being much older than them. When Ali a Hazara Afghan man also Baba’s servant, married Sanaubar society judged his decision. “People had raised their eyebrow when Ali, a man who memorized the Koran, married Sanaubar, a woman nineteen years younger, a beautiful but notoriously unscrupulous woman lived up to her dishonorable.” (Pp. 8, Hosseni). Ali is criticized...
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...What are the essential values and ideas presented in The Kite Runner? Analyse and assess how effective their representation is Hosseini has expressed copious essential values and ideas in his novel The Kite Runner (TKR) including Loyalty, Culture, Gender and Ethnicity and Atonement. Hosseini has expressed these through the combination of style, structure, characterisation, themes and setting. Due to the context of The Kite Runner, culture is an important idea presented because it has major significance in Afghanistan life and the characters are shaped by it. The majority of the novel is set in Afghanistan which is a country with a very strong culture. The culture of this novel is caused by the setting and is shown through language features, such as the use of Afghani words, and characterisation. “Tashakor.” Thank you This quote shows how Hosseini uses language features to demonstrate the culture and create a novel in which the characters seem real which gives it textual integrity. He uses these words to enrich the language but also explains what it means in English so that the reader can follow. Culture is also expressed in this novel through characterisation. Even when Amir and Baba go to America they still keep their Afghani culture and still partake in Afghani customs. This is shown in the novel through the relationship between Amir and Soraya. Even though they are living in America they follow the Afghani culture in their courtship and their engagement/wedding. Baba...
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...‘The Kite Runner’, written by Khaled Hosseini, is a novel based on the life journey of a man named Amir. Although very dark, through the use of important themes the book is made strongly relatable to young people. Three of these include: degradation, the fragile relationship between a father and his son and the pursuit for redemption. The fragility of a father and his son’s relationship is shown through the strong characterisation of both males and the constant use of proleptic irony embedded throughout their relationship. The symbols of rape express the theme of degradation and class discrimination, whereas the pursuit for redemption is conveyed through the dramatic sequences of events that occur during the course of the novel. Hosseini heavily emphasises the Afghani class discrimination, with the ‘pure’ Pashtuns being the dominate race over the low class, minority group of Hazaras. This degradation makes it very difficult for anyone to marry into another class and the Hazaras are often victims of physical, emotional and psychological abuse at the hands of Pashtuns. Hosseini uses the act of rape since it carries a great deal of significance as it demonstrates a symbolic violation of the powerless by those who have power. In each instance of rape we see that the rapist is always in a position of greater power both socially and physically. For instance, Assef, a well-known bully, is rich and has a politically powerful father, while, Amir’s friend and later, found to be half-brother...
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...How betrayal can lead to redemption Betrayal is an issue several people can relate to, either done by a family member or a friend. In the book The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, we witness how betrayal played a vital role in the downfall of the main characters Amir and Hassan’s friendship, and how it influenced Amir’s pursuit to redeem himself in hopes to move on from his mistakes. The novel begins with Amir as an adult, recalling an event that took place in 1975 Kabul, Afghanistan and how this event was what changed the rest of his life and made him who he now is. This event was Amir’s reluctance to help Hassan while he was being raped, and how this impacted his desire to, later on, mature and be “good” again. Khaled Hosseini shows how Amir’s Islamic faith and guilt over abandoning Hassan ultimately led Amir to forgive himself and seek redemption. All in all, this novel demonstrates that even in cases of betrayal, redemption is possible. In The Kite Runner, Hosseini tells a story of the close friendship of two young boys who come from different social classes, Amir, the Pashtun wealthy boy and Hassan, the Hazara servant. Taking place in Kabul, Afghanistan in the 1970s a time where there was a huge...
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...The author of ‘The Kite Runner' Hosseini employs a variety of symbols and motifs to create a deeper meaning throughout the book. Symbolism is the practice of representing a theme or idea by using symbols to create a deeper meaning, this is evident with cleft lip which is a symbol of Amir's and Hassan's social disparity, kites a symbol of happiness and guilt and the slingshot which a direct reference to David and Goliath. While irony is a motif because it is a recurring theme presented throughout the novel. The story revolves around two loyal friends Amir and Hassan, who are desperate to win the local kite flying competition. But both boys’ lives change for good that same afternoon when something devastating happens to Hassan. After the Russians invade, Amir and his father are forced to flee to America and amidst the turmoil Amir’s knows he will return to Afghanistan to redeem himself. Hosseini uses the cleft lip as a symbol to create a deeper meaning in the Kite Runner because it symbolizes Hassan’s status in society. This is evident because Amir and...
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...Research Paper on “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini Introduction: The international best-selling novel, The Kite Runner was first published in 2003 by Riverhead Books, written by the Afghan-born American novelist and physician, Khaled Hosseini. He was born into a Shia family in Kabul, and later on in his life when the family moved to Paris because of his father’s occupation, Hosseini’s family was unable to return to Kabul due to the bloody Saur Revolution; hence they had to seek political asylum in the United States. Being as young as he was, roughly 11 years of age, the actions of his home country must have left an impression on him. It is such a great read because among many other themes such as betrayal, redemption, bullying, inhumanities of revolution, discrimination, loyalty, hypocrisy, horrors of rapes etc. the main focus of this story is of a man who is haunted by his past demons. We see in some of the opening lines of the novel, “I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975… That was a long time ago, but it’s wrong what they say about the past, I’ve learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out.” These opening lines gets the ball rolling on what is to come and to be expected from the story, of possibly an aged man who is looking back at the past and justifying how it has made him the way that he is to date. The setting vividly takes place in the disorderly country of Kabul, Afghanistan...
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...The Tale of the Tape: Baba vs. Rahim Khan In Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner there are many themes that come up throughout the book, but the most important one that I had come across when reading the book was: love has no boundaries. Yes, the book revolves around Amir’s life and all that he had to go through, but no matter what Amir had going on he always had either Baba or Rahim Khan or both of them there for him. Both Baba and Rahim cared greatly for Amir and Hassan, no matter what the circumstance. As I read the book I witnessed Amir and Hassan growing up. Going through more struggles then any person, let alone child, should ever have to. But no matter how bad things got both of the boys had Baba and Rahim there looking out for them. Baba is the kind of guy who, if you did not know the kind of man he was you would be scared of him. Whereas Rahim Khan was the complete opposite of Baba, he was always...
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...“Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini is New York Times #1 bestseller. I loved reading this book. It discusses the sociological issues of Afghanistan. It involves, opposite religions, tells about family and friendship, the presence and how into the feelings of poor and rich, it also refers to the war of Afghanistan and all its troubles. The narrator of the book, who also is apart of the story, is named Amir. Amir grew up peacefully when he was little, as he grew older, the country’s revolution began and Russian forces invade Afghanistan. There are two different kinds of Muslims, Amir was one kind and his servant, and also his one and only best friend, like a brother, is another kind of Muslim. Conflict between to different sides of the religion separates these two brothers apart, so does war. Amir and his father were rich, and Hassan and his father were poor. Amir and Hassan share the same father, who is Amir’s father, but nobody knows until it came time for the father to die. Amir and Hassans friendship fell apart for the fact that Amir was rich, and the presence of Hassan at his side at all times other than a servant embarrassed him. Also during the war, Amir and his father get away to America while Hassan and his father stay back in their country and try and live. This book shows you the different kinds of people. How there are some that will fight for what they believe in, and others who will let it all go and run away from it no matter how much money they have spent...
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...BOOM! The deafening sound of explosions still echo around my skull. I served three years in Afghanistan. They made it sound so exciting in recruitment, “Serving one’s country”. I always wanted to be a hero. I was nothing before I enlisted, and now, even after my discharge, I’m still nothing. A worthless piece of shrapnel, blighting society. It was the roadside bomb that changed me. There we were, driving along one of Afghanistan’s endless lonely roads, if you could even call them roads, just tracks in the sand really, here today, gone tomorrow, a bit like me. The bomb, it was meant for us, the “enemy” troops; but instead it claimed the lives of the innocent. A family of five, seeking refuge, were it’s victims. How where they to know? They were dead before their car had even hit the ground, they didn’t stand a chance. At least they didn’ suffer. Can you imagine what that does to a man? Afghanistan. It used to be my reality, but now it is my worst nightmare. I’m a reject. Everybody who I was ever close to, gone. I lash out, I never mean to hurt them. I can’t control myself any more. They mess with my head, it’s like they’re inside me, dictating my every action. They don’t understand, they don’t know what I saw out there. They never had to watch young men and women gunned down in the streets, their lives only really just beginning. They never had to watch their best friend slowly gasping for his final breath in a roadside ditch. They will never understand my pain. Torture, that’s...
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...Simrat Sangha Ms. Hommen ENG3U0 December 7, 2014 In the novel, “Kite runner” by Khaled Hosseini the childhood of a small town boy by the name of Amir unfolds, when we realize that he lives under a shadow of guilt. He grows up, changes and is affected by his environment –whether that is Afghanistan or California. Transforming into a portrait of an immensely likeable and dominant character. After proving himself honorable when he makes up for his mistakes, overcomes his fears and acknowledges his misdeeds. Amir is a credible protagonist as he took the recognition to become a better person and seek redemption for all his mistakes. Although at first he tried to bury his sins by forgetting the past and living in the present day America, he was called home with an unexpected opportunity to work towards forgiveness. “There is a way to be good again…Rahim Khan had said on the phone just before hanging up, said it almost as an after thought.” (Hosseini, 202) Amir’s opportunity to be “good again” appears unforeseen, when suddenly returning to Afghan seems like the only way to atone for his sins now. He seeks out for Hassan’s orphaned son, Sohrab as he risks his life in order to rescue him. Through saving Sohrab’s life in a way, Amir has saved his own. “Been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years.”(Hosseini, 1) This is a little teaser in the beginning of the book that hints an event that has largely defined the course of Amir’s life ever since. This foreshadows...
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...Hugo Varlamos Greve Period 2 January 16th, 2016 The Kite Runner Lit Analysis Outline Amir is a Pashtun and Hassan is a Hazara. Two common people with different places in society. Mainly both of them go through struggles in Afghanistan facing their families, neighbors and the outside world, but certainly Hassan and his son Sohrab undergo a variety of beatings and annihilation to his physical and mental being. The constant torture that occurs in the novel eventually ends up with a sign of giving up for many of the characters. In The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini uses the eyes of the lamb to demonstrate vulnerability, sacrifice and resignation of the characters in dire situations. To start things off, when Hassan is marooned in an alleyway by Assef and his goons and is about to get raped, he stops struggling and fighting for himself. Amir looks into Hassan’s eyes and sees a similar look of the eyes of a lamb about to be slaughtered, “I saw the resignation in it. It was a look i had seen before. It was the look of the lamb,” (Hosseini 76). Adding onto this context, Hosseini is indicating that Assef is the dominant male in this situation. He is simply forcing Hassan as the inferior one by showing his dominance and raping him. This sign of dominance simply shows that there is no hope for...
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