As well there is Baba, who is another important character who shows courage by first taking in Ali and Hassan, who are part of the Hazara, a minority group, and letting them serve in his household as a servant, even though they are Hazaras: “Amir, Hassan, and their fathers live together in a well-off neighborhood of Kabul. The Hazaras act as servants to their Pashtun superiors, but are also part of the family, clashing with the social norm” (Spiegel 2007).This was a courageous act since the whole Pashtun community is against the Hazaras living in his household as it violated the normal rules and expectations of the Kabul community and it would have been considered a deviant act in a sense. This does not only show his act of courage but also
In the story The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, I find that Hosseini uses an abundance of symbolism to get his point across to the readers. The collection of quotes Hosseini writes had me stop to think about what the meaning behind his words was. It really made me think deeply about the meaning of each quote. He states the quote, and leaves it for the reader to decide his or her own musings to it. His words truly caught my attention. “With me as the glaring exception, my father molded the world around him to his liking. The problem, of course, was that Baba saw the world in black and white. And he got to decide what was black and what was white. You can’t love a person who lives that way without fearing him too. Maybe even hating him a little”
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.
A Friend is injured, beaten, and blamed. You stand as a witness and accomplice to his pain, yet your voice remains silent, and it tears you apart. Do you confess? It feels like an impossible choice, but one that should not be taken lightly. Since he was a child, Amir has been carrying the weight of his own guilt for not aiding Hassan during his time of great need. This sin has kept him from enjoying the life that he once knew, because the knowledge that he should have done something gnaws at the back of his head, and the repercussions of his actions have had an opposite effect of what he was expecting. Amir is a coward, but knows he is in the wrong and seeks redemption, as an overwhelming need to be punished grows within him. As time passes, Amir seeks the truths of redemption, and realizes that one can be redeemed through courage, sacrifice, and loyalty.
Khaled Hosseini uses irony to advance the plot, theme, and characters in his story, The Kite Runner. Irony is a form of language or expression that involves a discrepancy with the outcome of the situation being a contrast of what is expected, and is often comprehended in a mocking or surprising way. His situational and dramatic examples of irony contribute to the sincerity of the storyline because it’s a parallel to the tragic reality our world is suspended in. Khaled Hosseini uses irony to expose the veracity of relationships encompassed by deception, injustice, and corruption in a subtle manner that involves discovering the significance of the theme through analysis and interpretation. Irony is added to themes, such as the transformation
While on a truck, he defended the women. Willing to take the bullet without hesitation, he put his life on the line for the stranger, for his passion had been stronger than his fear of death. Baba acted out of bravery due to his grand stature, level head, and big heart, “when all six-foot-five of him thundered into the room, attention shifted to him like sunflowers turning to the sun” (13). Baba was well respected in Afghanistan, and he knew that his voice would be heard; therefore, he used his power as a way to defend the defenseless. He was willing to sacrifice himself even though his son disagreed with the idea. Amir thought only of himself and that he would be left as an orphan if Baba was shot; whereas Baba wanted to help the woman as long as he was only risking his own life. His heart reached out for anyone needing an extra hand. He loved and cared for so many people, he wanted to help all of them. Baba put in hard work to help the people around him, and they all looked up to him due to “the marks he had left on people’s lives” (174). Baba’s willingness to sacrifice himself for strangers shaped his reputation in Afghanistan.
One of this novel’s themes is the ability to redeem oneself by removing political and religious barriers and fighting for what is right, without allowing obstacles to prevent such action. In the first quotation presented, Amir redeems himself for hiding money beneath Hassan’s mattress to frame him for larceny. Years later he has “planted a fistful of crumpled money under a mattress” (pg. 254), this time it’s to provide for an impoverished household. This is Amir’s way of starting to apologize to Hassan. The subsequent quote presents Amir realizing that the only way to be released from his past is by repenting. Amir says ““I have a wife in America, a home, a career and a family”. But how could I pack up and go back home when my actions may have
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 expression "riddled with guilt" is a good way to describe the main character's life, Amir, in the book The Kite Runner, written by Khaled Hosseini. The Kite Runner is a story about an Afghan boy, Amir, who has many hardships throughout his life as he grows from a boy living in war-torn Afghanistan, to a successful writer living in America. Amir experiences many events that caused him to carry a great amount of guilt throughout his life. So much guilt that it even turned him into an insomniac. He needed to find a way to make amends which would allow him to forgive himself and hopefully, one day, be able to sleep soundly again.
Guilt is a strong emotion that haunts us all, others hide it deep within themselves, some try to fix the wrong, and few people do good from it. The Kite Runner is the story of a boy named Amir, he struggles to find his place in the world, reason being of the all of the traumatic childhood events. He sends most of his time and life just sulking in guilt about the decisions he has made. Khaled Hosseini has given the idea that guilt can make you do good things, but all relies on what you're guilty about. The way this is portrayed is through the novel is through rhetorical strategies and imagery.
The circumstances in which this passage takes place is obviously the time after Hassan's rape, in which the guilt is killing is torturing Amir and he is has realized that the choices that he made that day has truly hurt more people than he could've ever imagined. A metaphor that I found that led me to believe this would be him saying, ". . . the monster in the lake". I think that this metaphor represents the moment in which Amir has begun to acknowledge that he is the person that unintentionally is causing the ones around him to suffer with his selfish actions, the monster. Another metaphor that I found would be, "I was the snake in the grass". This metaphor represents Amir seeing that the people who are around him get hurt by him unexpectedly. Think of Amir as obviously the snake hiding within the grass and he's the predator. Hassan would be the prey
“I thought about Hassan’s dream, the one about us swimming in the lake. There is no monster, he’s said, just water. Expect he’d been wrong about that. There was a monster in the lake… I was that monster.” When looking at this quote some may wonder who would be considered the monster; and in this case Amir would be. The idea of him redeeming himself from being a monster is a recurring theme in the story and the movie.
The Kite Runner, a novel a filled with betrayal, guilt, and redemption, tells a story of Amir as he struggles with his past. Khaled Hosseini uses past events to show how they can affect a character in both a negative and positive way. Due to past events, Hassan and Amirs' relationship is almost completely destroyed, and Amir is constantly overwhelmed with guilt. These past events, both positively and negatively, affect Amir where he must contend with the aspects of his past. Amir must make amends with his past where it served to benefit and hinder him because he struggles to get over the guilt of his betrayal, and tries to atone for his sins by going to Kabul.
The Kite Runner is a novel that is filled with betrayal, guilt, and redemption. Khaled Hosseini uses past events to show how they can affect a character in both a negative and positive way. Due to past events, Hassan and Amirs' relationship is almost completely destroyed, and Amir is constantly overwhelmed with guilt. The past events both, positively and negatively, affect Amir where he must contend with the aspects of the past. Amir must make amends with his past where it served to benefit and hinder him because he struggles to get over the guilt of his betrayal, and tries to atone for his sins by going to Kabul.
“He was the embodiment of every parent’s dream, a strong, tall, well-dressed and well mannered boy with talent and striking looks”- Hosseini 96