Quotes From 'The Kite Runner'

Analysis: Amir starts to realize how much he misses hanging out with Hassan. He understands his thoughts about all the times he had spent with Hassan that he starts to feel alone without him by Amir's side. Amir wants Hassan to come back and live their lives exactly how they used to when both of them were children. Amir comprehends that Hassan was always a loyal and true friend to him and he feels guilty about not acting the same way towards him.

Throughout the whole book, Amir has been vying for love from his father, often against Hassan, and feels powerless when he does not get it; this causes him to attempt to assert power in other aspects of his life, usually over Hassan. Amir feels as if Baba does not love him, and feels powerless to fix it; he says, “I always felt like Baba hated me a little, And why not? After all, I had killed his beloved wife, his beautiful princess, hadn’t I? The least I could have done was to have the decency to have turned out a little more like him. But I hadn’t turned out like him. Not at all” (Hosseini 19). He believes there is nothing he can do to make his father love him; after all, he cannot change the past, and he cannot change himself substantially. This feeling of powerlessness affects him in such a way that he feels the need to compensate for this loss of power elsewhere in his life. He would exploit the kindness and forgiveness Hassan always showed him, and would try and prove his superiority and worth in that relationship. Amir once asked if Hassan would eat dirt if he asked him to, and afterwards said, “I knew I was being cruel, like when I’d taunt him if he didn’t know some big word. But there was something fascinating--albeit in a sick way--about teasing Hassan. Kind of like when we used to play insect torture. Except now he was the ant and I was holding the magnifying glass,” (Hosseini 54). Amir is filling the power gap he feels in his life with power over Hassan, and is trying to show Hassan how much control he has over him. Hassan, Amir’s servant and a genuinely kind person, is in a vulnerable position against Amir,

Amir cannot stand to look at Hassan and seeing the lamb-like eyes, so to make himself feel better about the situation, he frames Hassan. Amir is upset that Baba forgives Hassan but it is ironic because he is the one doing the sinful act and yet again it is Hassan who is saving and protecting Amir. These unfaithful acts are not in fact an act of selflessness but and an act of selfishness. Everything Amir is doing is for himself. He only cares about his own feelings but never is he putting himself in others people’s

Born in Kabul, Afghanistan, Amir was the son of a wealthy social worker. He was brought up with the son of his servant, and perhaps his only best friend, Hassan. Amir had a rocky relation with his father. At times, it seemed as his father loved him but those moments didn’t lasted forever. He thinks Baba (his father) wishes Amir were more like him, and that Baba holds him responsible for killing his mother, who died during his birth. Despite being best friends, Amir thinks that Hassan is beneath him because he belonged to an inferior cast. He used to mock him jokingly or tried to outsmart him. In all fairness, it was Amir’s cowardly nature that

In Runner, Robert Newton conveys that Charlie the protagonist is bound to mature early to make completely selfless choices. When his father dies, Charlie is contrived to fill his father’s boots, meaning he had to take up his father’s role of being the financial provider of his family. Additionally, Charlie makes an altruistic choice by running for squizzy Taylor. Lastly, Charlie makes the self-sacrificing decision by gambling his large saving from Squizzy on the Ballarat Mile. In summary, Newton demonstrates that Charlie is forced into adulthood early through necessity and make self-denying decisions due to his family's desperate circumstances.

The love and disputes between father and son. The relationship that Amir has with Baba is quite complicated. Amir constantly tries to earn Baba’s love and respect while Baba has a hard time accepting how Amir is and compares him to Hassan. While travelling to Pakistan in the back of the truck Amir felt sick quite often by which Baba was quite annoyed. “I saw it on his embarrassed face the couple of times my stomach had clenched so badly I had moaned. When the blurly guy with the beads-the praying woman’s husband-asked if I was going to get sick, I said I might. Baba looked away.”In addition to this when Amir throws up, Baba apologizes to the fellow passengers to which Amir feels guilty and annoyed that he is just 18 and the way Baba is behaving is as if car sickness is a crime. This suggests that Baba was expecting Amir to be more self controlled and strong so that he didn’t feel sick showing us the conflicts he has with Amir as he expects a lot from him.

19). Since Amir thought that he had killed his mother, he always believed that his father, Baba, hated him for it. Amir uses this perceived reason as explanation for why Baba stayed distant from him, and never addressed this issue, keeping the shame for something that he should not feel guilty for. Adding on, Amir also felt guilty for allowing Hassan to get attacked by Assef and not saving his best friend. After the attack occurred near the beginning of the book, Hosseini continuously mentions the event and how terrible Amir feels, even years after. This shame motivated Amir to go back to Afghanistan and find Hassan’s son, as well as bringing him back to America (Hosseini, 2003). Finally, Baba also had guilt to bear in the novel. Baba was Hassan’s biological father. “How had Baba brought himself to

Rahim Khan told Amir that Hassan was his half brother, that is why Baba always acted differently towards Hassan, because Baba longed to show Hassan fatherly affection. Also, Rahim Khan told Amir that Hassan and his wife were both killed by the Taliban and they had son name Sohrab who was still alive and living in orphanage in Karteh-seh. And Rahim Khan believed that for there to be good again in Amir’s life he would have to go find Sohrab, and bring him to Thomas agha and Betty khanum. Even though Rahim Khan knew these people did not exist, he just wanted Amir to raise Sohrab and give him a good life, just like Baba tried to do for Hassan and

After Amir betrays Hassan, he feels ashamed as a child, and the guilt follows him into adulthood. The friendship between Amir and Hassan vanishes after Hassan was raped. Amir is having trouble dealing with all the guilt he acquired from not doing anything when Hassan was sexually abused. Seeing Hassan everyday resurfaces Amir’s guilt. In an attempt to get Hassan to leave, Amir hides his birthday money and an expensive watch under Hassan’s mattress, framing him. Hassan admits it was him who stole the money, even though it wasn’t. Amir knew at this moment “[He] is the snake in the grass, the monster in the lake. [He] wasn’t worthy of this sacrifice. [He] was a liar, a cheat, and a thief” (105). Amir knows what he did to Hassan was wrong, and knows that Hassan didn’t deserve what he had put him through.

Furthermore, Amir forgives Baba for not telling him that Amir and Hassan are half-brothers. Hassan gets treated very well by Baba, considering he is a server at Baba’s house. Hassan gets great birthday presents, and he is always welcome to father-son activities with Amir and Baba. Sometimes Amir is jealous and doesn’t understand why Hassan gets treated the same as himself. Amir wants to be treated better, because he is Baba’s son, and Hassan is Baba’s servant. What Amir doesn’t know is that Hassan is his half-brother. Years later, Rahim Kahn tells him this when Amir visits him in Pakistan. Amir learns that a long time ago, Baba had an affair with a Hazara woman, which was socially unacceptable. Out of this affair, a child was born: Hassan. Hassan is not Ali’s son; Hassan is Baba’s son. Baba never tells Amir, and this makes Amir very angry and disappointed. For Amir, his father is a hero and not a liar. However, when Rahim Kahn explains Baba’s situation and why he acted this way, Amir starts to

At first, Amir does not seek to earn redemption. We know that he is ashamed at what he has done but he prefers to hide his guilt rather than confess and redeem himself right away. After the incident, Amir attempted to avoid Hassan at all costs. Even when Hassan approached him to see if he wanted to go for a walk, like they used to do frequently, Amir refused to go with him and told him to go away (88). He knew that he didn't deserve his friends unwavering love and loyalty.

Every one of Amir’s faults can be compared to one of Hassan’s strengths, and so Amir was a reminder of Baba's betrayal to Ali. Amir can identify with this because Hassan has been a reminder of his own guilt and his betrayal of his friend and brother. He understands that people are imperfect and that guilt and regret can cause more mistakes. Of all the ways Amir is changed by the events of December 1975, his decision to adopt Hassan’s son is the most profound.

From reading chapters one to four, one of the main aspects of Amir and Hassan’s relationship is the sense of control Amir has over Hassan. It becomes apparent that Amir is the one with the most authority in their friendship when he ‘talked’ Hassan into firing walnuts at the neighbour’s one-eyed German shepherd, ‘Hassan never wanted to, but if I asked, really asked, he wouldn’t deny me’. This highlights the way Hassan looks up to Amir and obeys him due to their religious, cultural and social differences, ‘I was a Sunni and he was a Shi’a’. Nevertheless, Amir does express his sensitive side towards Hassan and feels protective over him, especially when he can see he’s upset, ‘I reached across my seat, slung my

Throughout the novel, Amir endeavors to be approved by his father, Baba, who is admired by people in Kabul. Unfortunately, Baba believes that Amir, unlike him, is very unmanly “and [that he] never fights back. He just... drops his head ” (Hosseini 24). Since Baba wishes for a son who would stand up for himself, he can’t help but observe that Amir’s friend Hassan, as the guy who “steps in and fends the [bullies] off” (Hosseini 24) is his idea of the ideal son. Though aware of his father’s expectations, Amir is unable to change himself and instead envies Hassan and the fact that Baba treats him like his own son by“[patting]Hassan on the back. [and even putting] his arm around his shoulder [like a fatherly figure]”(Hosseini 15). Despite the manifestation of this hatred in Amir, he continues to recognize the bond that he shares with Hassan, “ brotherhood between people who had fed from the same breast” (Hosseini 11) which is because both their mothers died during birth. The confusing emotions he feels for Hassan has Amir face a situation in which he acts inappropriately and allows the guilt to manifest upon him. After winning a very important kite tournament for the first time and “seeing Baba on that roof, proud of [him] at last” (Hosseini 71) Amir begins to search for Hassan who had gone to run his kite earlier. Finally, Amir finds him in a dark alley and as he “peeks around the corner” (Hosseini 75) he witnesses a sight that eradicated not only his relationship with Hassan but also Baba’s brotherly relationship with Ali, Hassan’s father. Peeking through the corner of the alley, like a bystander, he watches his one and only friend getting raped. The guilt that came upon him was for two reason; one, his lack of courage to stand up to

Amir and Baba never got along, which caused Amir to believe that all father-son relationships are like his. Amir does not understand that parents are supposed to unconditionally love their children, like the love Hassan receives from Ali. Showing the differences in Amir and Hassan’s reactions to this story due to their relationships with their fathers explains the significance of having a bond between father and son.