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The Kite Runner

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Objective Summary In The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, the readers start off following Amir in 1970s Afghanistan. Amir is a rich child who lives with his father and their servants. Their servants are Ali and his son Hassan. Hassan and Amir are best friends. One day, the two boys run into the town bully Assef. Assef threatens them because Hassan is a Hazara which is basically a second class citizen. Hassan then threatens Assef with a slingshot pointed at his eye and he escapes with Amir. Amir has a inadequate relationship with his father, Baba. Baba and Amir do not share the same interests. For instance, Amir writes a story and tries to show it to his father. Instead of reading the story, Baba’s friend Rahim Khan reads it and praises Aamir …show more content…

Amir wins the kite contest and Baba’s praise, and Hassan goes to catch the second place kite so they can keep it as a souvenir. When Amir goes to find Hassan he ends up seeing him cornered in an alley by Assef and his friends. While Amir hides and watches, Hassan is beaten up, pinned to the ground, and sexually assaulted by Assef. Subsequently, Ali and Hassan choose to leave the house after Amir frames Hassan for stealing his belongings. Suddenly, the book jumps to 1981 and war has started in Afghanistan. Baba and Amir fled to America where Baba worked at a gas station and Amir attended high school. Amir graduated graduated, met a girl named Soraya and went to college. At the same time, Baba was diagnosed with a lethal cancer, but he chose not to go through treatment. Before Baba died, Amir and Soraya had their …show more content…

Now about five years older, Amir and Hassan have a problem in their relationship due to Amir feeling guilt over Hassan’s rape. Amir did not step in and save Hassan when he was being sexually assaulted, so Amir tries to avoid Hassan and the guilt that comes with him. They talk under the pomegranate tree and Amir pelted Hassan with pomegranates asking Hassan to hit him back. Hosseini writes, “I don't know how many times I hit him. All I know is that, when I finally stopped, exhausted and panting, Hassan was smeared in red like he'd been shot by a firing squad. I fell to my knees, tired, spent, frustrated. Then Hassan did pick up a pomegranate. He walked toward me. He opened it and crushed it against his own forehead. ‘There,’ he croaked, red dripping down his face like blood. ‘Are you satisfied? Do you feel better?’ He turned around and started down the hill”(Hosseini, 2003, p. 93). Amir throwing the pomegranates at Hassan represented their relationship because Amir was only throwing them to get Hassan to punish him not only for the pomegranates, but for letting him get sexually assaulted. Hassan hitting himself over the head shows the audience that Hassan does not blame Amir for letting it happen. The tree was a place that showed a nurturing, beautiful, and innocent relationship to the audience, but now it is a place that shows guilt, anger, and hatred between the

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