Bad Decisions In The Kite Runner

In his critically acclaimed first novel, The Kite Runner, author Khaled Hosseini tells the story of a 12-year-old Afghan boy named Amir, who seeks his father’s love but is hindered by his own cowardice. Both Amir’s cowardice and his father’s lack of attention are compounded by the people and events surrounding Amir, until they feed into each other in a vicious, never-ending cycle.

In the novel The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini tells a notable coming-of-age story portraying the actions and thoughts of Amir, a penitent adult living in the United States and his reminiscence of his affluent childhood in the unstable political environment of Afghanistan. Throughout the novel Khaled Hosseini uses character description to display his thoughts on sin and redemption.

It is in human’s nature to make mistakes, but what is important is how we solve those mistakes. The novel The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini explores the theme of redemption. Khaled Hosseini conveys the theme of redemption through the character by when sins are made redemption can be found. This is first demonstrated when Amir betrays Hassan by not standing up for him when he was getting raped but later makes peace with Hassan. Secondly, when Baba cannot accept Amir for who he is, later he then redeems himself by making him a new life.

The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini, depicts the journey Amir takes to redeem himself from his past mistakes. Hosseini portrays that humans sin, but they have the possibility to redeem themselves from their past. Amir lives most of his life regretting a decision he made years ago. Later, when Rahim Khan, an old family friend, reminds Amir, “There is a way to be good again,” Amir begins to make amends for his past mistakes (Hosseini 2). Hosseini uses Amir's journey to illustrate when humans sin, the desire to be good pushes them to redeem themselves.

How, after years of guilt, self-disgust, and deception, is it possible for one person to become good again? Entrapped in a cage of cowardice for so long, can they ever develop and grow as a normal human being? Amir, the anti-hero in Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, seeks to answer these questions in his own search for atonement through various existential events in his life.

As children, people are taught that actions have consequences, good and bad. One of these consequences can be guilt or remorse, the self-imposed punishment for bad behavior. Whether it be after calling a person an unkind name or upsetting someone else, guilt affects people from a very young age. Guilt possesses the power to shape the type of person someone is and is the leading force behind redemption. Many of the characters within the novel The Kite Runner written by Khaled Hosseini are affected by the power that guilt has. The novel focuses on guilt as one of its main ideas, the value becoming the driving force behind many of the actions that characters take and shows the tremendous power that guilt has. Over the course of the novel, guilt remains a main value for many of the characters and affects how the characters and conflicts of the characters develop. The characters Sanaubar, Amir, and Baba in Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner demonstrate guilt’s extraordinary power to change the course of someone’s life and push them towards redemption.

Think about some of the worst mistakes you have made. Is it possible to redeem yourself? That’s the battle for Amir who is the main character of the story as he takes you through his life of events from a child to an adult. Amir starts off the story feeling ignored by his father Baba and as the story continues you will see him Betray his best friend Hassan letting him get assaulted by a town bully Assef. That event will determine the outcome of the main scene that happens towards the end of the story. “The knuckles shattering my jaw. Choking in my own teeth, the sound of my ribs snapping” (Hosseini 288). The scene in which Amir goes to save Sohrab from Assef and his men in Khaled Hosseini’s novel, The Kite Runner, is important because Hosseini

The Kite Runner is a powerful book contrasting selfishness and selflessness. The book follows the life of Amir, a character who experiences guilt and tragedy throughout his life. While growing up in Kabul, Amir witnesses the imperfect and prejudice society in his country. Within an imperfect society, there are many who are self-invested, and among those, there are those who are selfless. Characters Amir and Hassan possess selfish and selfless traits. The traits that these characters possess are influenced by fear, victimization, and loyalty, ultimately leading them to inaction and action.

In life, nothing comes without sacrifice. In order to achieve our goals, and reach our highest of peaks, we must give up one thing to obtain another. In some cases, this might require a sacrifice as demanding as selling a limb to feed your family. In Khaled Hosseini’s novel, The Kite Runner, protagonist Amir embarks on a gut-wrenching journey of betrayal, sacrifice, and eventually redemption. He is given an opportunity to make up for his past mistakes, and “be good again” (2). As Amir’s character evolves over the course of the novel, new truths about redemption emerge, for Amir is not only able to redeem himself, but is able to come to terms with the truth, giving back to the life which he once abandoned.

In Hosseini’s novel, The Kite Runner, mistakes and their confrontation is a major theme. The Kite Runner takes us on the journey of life as an immigrant through the eyes of refugee Amir. It is through the mistakes of Amir and his family and friends that the novel develops. The most significant and central mistake in the novel is of Amir not standing up for Hassan whilst he is being raped. Although this mistake is the most significant and central one, I will also look into two others; Baba cheating with Ali’s wife and Soraya and her previous marriage. To confront our mistakes we may try to ‘redeem ourselves’ by doing good that we believe may make up for this mistake or even just getting this mistake out in the open and talking about it. The

Finding a way to satisfy even the smallest aches and pains of life is refreshing, especially when it’s through hard work and sacrifice. In The Kite Runner, written by Khaled Hosseini, the main character Amir fights and struggles his whole life to redeem himself of a chain of huge mistakes he made when he was a child by betraying his best friend. As Amir strives for peace in his life, he is taught more about what it means to have honor and sacrifice as well as learning more about the truths that hide in redemption.

Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner is a remarkable coming-of-age novel describing and revealing the thoughts and actions of Amir, a compunctious adult in the United States and his memories of his affluent childhood in the unstable political environment of Afghanistan. The novel showcases the simplistic yet powerful ability of guilt to influence decisions and cause conflict which arises between Amir’s childhood friend and half-brother, Hassan; Amir’s father, Baba; and importantly, himself. Difference in class The quest to become “good again” causes a reflection in Amir to atone for his sins and transform into the person of which he chooses to be.

The line which resonated with me the most is spoken by Baba when he says, “It may be unfair, but what happens in a few days, sometimes even a single day, can change the course of a whole lifetime” (Hosseini 150). This quotation revolves around the topic of decision making, the choices that one makes can have a large impact on their life, in both negative and positive ways. This is evident through Soraya’s poor decisions that she makes throughout her period as an adolescent. She chooses to abandon her parents and move in with her boyfriend which results in her facing various negative outcomes such as becoming a drug addict, ruining her’s and her family’s reputation, and by losing her opportunity to get married, she became considered a promiscuous

John Piper once said, “Redemption is not perfection, the redeemed must realize their mistakes.” One can see an idea similar to this in Kahled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner. In the story, the author sends the message that redemption can be a lifelong pursuit, and until achieved, happiness will not be obtained.

The consequences of the past are inescapable and the choices a person makes can influence the rest of his life. There is no way to change the past, so once important choices are made it is impossible to reverse time and change those decisions. Khaled Hosseini explores this idea of having to live with past decisions in his compelling novel The Kite Runner. To enforce the message of how inescapable the past truly is, the main character of Hosseini’s book, Amir, betrays his closest friend and struggles to cope with the haunting consequences of this betrayal. Through Amir’s complex character development and The Kite Runner’s distinctive plot structure, those who read the novel gain a deeper understanding of Amir’s decisions as a result of his past mistakes via Hosseini’s use of foreshadowing and flashbacks. By creating a unique relationship between the past and present in the novel, Hosseini urges readers to ponder the consequences of mistakes and reflect on their own past.