Extended Essay – English A1
Research Question:
What perspectives are illuminated by author Khaled Hosseini’s use of a retrospective child narrator in the novel The Kite Runner?
Word Count: 3985
December 2017
Table of Contents:
Title Page: page 1
Table of Contents: page 2
Introduction: page 3
Main Body: page 5-12
Conclusion: page 13-14
Bibliography: page 15 Introduction:
The basis of The Kite Runner is concrete, encircling around the story of two young boys and their difficult relationship. Amir, the only child of his widely loved father and left without a mother, has grown up in the streets of Kabul with Hassan, a marginalized Hazara who works as both Amir’s servant and best friend. Amir, who now finds himself as an adult looking back on his past, recounts the traumatic childhood events whose aftereffects have left him struggling to find his place in the world. Author Khaled Hosseini brings forth a child’s point of view, allowing the readers to sympathize with the narrator and recounting events from their own childhood. Thus, it highlights my research question: What perspectives are illuminated by author Khaled Hosseini’s use of a retrospective child narrator in the novel The Kite Runner? The purpose and technique of youth in novels has been somewhat part of uncharted territory and under researched. As Tim Love explains one apparent reason is that, “even the best adult books with child narrators risk being treated as if they are children’s books” (Love). With such a perspective on works of literature, they have been academically diminished and considered undeserving of critical analysis. However, child narration or the focus on youth creates a much deeper layer for the audience while reading. I have always had a passionate interest in perspective stemming from my encounter with Julio Cortázar’s novels. Cortázar even states in his novel Cuentos Completos, “children look unflinchingly straight at things until the time comes when they are taught to locate themselves in the gaps between as well” (66). He utilizes the power of child narrators fantastically, and I wished to see how other authors utilized child narration to create powerful
When Khaled Hosseini wrote The Kite Runner, he made several important choices involving narration. He chose to write the story in first person from a limited point of view. This is a very fitting decision because, writing in the first person adds a sense of intimacy that is crucial to this story; writing from a limited perspective allows the reader to make their own conclusions about what the characters are thinking. The way Hosseini writes The Kite Runner makes it very intimate, and feels like a person telling their life story. If The Kite Runner had been written in third person, or omnisciently, the story would not have impacted readers as much, and would have been too cold and impersonal to create emotional connections with the reader.
Khalede Hosseini’s The Kite Runner represents the story of a young, aspiring author Amir, who takes a journey of sin and guilt, and his path to redemption through the power of words.
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.
“ For you, a thousand times over”. This one sentence sums up the immense love, loyalty and friendship Hassan had for Amir.
Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner, is most definitely different than other authors. He uses strong, detailed words that may be difficult, at some points, to understand. His use of vocabulary is rather challenging for me. The more use of challenging vocabulary, in my opinion, makes the book even more interesting. Now, I’m not a big fan of reading, but after reading this book, I had found an interest in reading more challenging books like The Kite Runner. Not knowing a word can change the whole scene by finding out what it actually means. Now, Khaled uses a wide variety of figurative language to grab your attention.
The Kite Runner is a film based on the first novel of Khaled Hosseini, which was published in 2003 and became a bestseller, thus was translated to many different languages and spread around the world, becoming a discussion topic for quite a while. One of the reasons why this book is so rich and attractive is the variety of characters, which are all born in Afghanistan and spent at least most of their childhood there, but at the same time have different views, virtues and experience. And those characters, depending on the generation they belong to, are shaped by particular circumstances, political and historical events.
The Kite Runner written by Khaled Hosseini can be seen as a great book but at the same time one that is too simple and easy. In discussions of The Kite Runner, one controversial issue has been the inner levels of the novel. On one hand, many people believe that the novel is filled with numerous themes that are deep and make one think about the human experience and will leave you thinking long after you finish reading it. On the other hand, there are also many literary critics who contend that opinion and say that the novel is overly sentimental and simplistic. The view I obtained while reading The Kite Runner would be in agreement with the first statement. I also believe that the novel is deep and makes one think
“There is a way to be good again” (2). This is the line that rolls through Amir's mind over and over throughout Khaled Hosseini's novel, The Kite Runner. This is the story of a mans struggle to find redemption. The author illustrates with the story of Amir that it is not possible to make wrongs completely right again because its too late to change past. In this novel Hosseini is telling us that redemption is obtainable, and by allowing us to see Amirs thought process throughout the novel, Hosseini shows us that it guilt is the primary motivation for someone who seeks redemption. Hosseini also uses not only the main character, but other secondary characters to show how big of a part that guilt plays in the desire for redemption. In this
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.
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 Kite Runner was written by Khaled Hosseini and published in 2003. It tells the story of Amir, a young boy from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Hassan, his father’s Hazara servant. The story is set against a backdrop of tumultuous events, from the fall of Afghanistan’s Monarchy, through the Soviet Military intervention, the exile of Pakistan refugees to America, and the rise of the Taliban. The main theme of this book focuses on guilt and redemption. Throughout the novel, Amir is constantly trying to redeem himself. Early on, Amir strives to redeem himself through his father’s eyes primarily because his mother died giving birth to him, and he feels responsible. The more important part of Amir’s search for
Sigmund argues “I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father’s protection”. A child’s treatment in their early memories directly impacts a child’s future. Moreover, it is important for elder figures such as fathers to raise their children with genuine love, protection, and care. In the novel, “The Kite Runner” the connection between a father and son may not always be one of love, but rather it is loaded with compassion and satisfies their needs which help prepares a child to understand right from wrong. In The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini uses the complex emotional bond between fathers and sons to demonstrate the necessity of a sympathetic fatherly figure to protect
Here in this essay I will discuss the complex relationship between father and son to demonstrate the need for a father figure in the novel "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini. The relationship between a parent and a child is a precious and haunted bond, but is not always a love relationship, but a relationship is full of pain and longing. The relationships clearly demonstrate this need for a father figure are those between Baba and Amir, and Amir and Sohrab.
Through the portrayal of a society where politics are ethnic-based, masculinity being amplified is only one of the few thematic ideas that are present, others include the atonement of sins, resentment, immigration, expectations in a father-son relationship and barriers between different classes or castings. Concentrating primarily on subject of immigration, another significant parallel is present. In a biography of author Khaled Hosseini, Great Neck Publishing discusses Hosseini’s life, “The family subsisted on welfare during their first year in the country, with Hosseini 's father working at a flea market for extra income before finding a job as a driving instructor”. Relating back to the revelation of multiple themes, Hosseini depicts the struggles immigrants face while adapting to a new culture and environment of an unknown abode in The Kite Runner, similarly as he did himself, through Amir and Baba’s life abroad in America. Although Baba was a well reputed man back in his homeland, he too struggled, like Hosseini’s father, to being financially stable, which is evident through his job at the flea market, ultimately representing how they had to start over. Hosseini conveys the struggles of his characters in a fictitious text as a portrayal of his real life experiences which quite pointedly makes the novel more influential for readers to grasp onto the events that take place around the world thereby acknowledging the minorities, such as the
The story is based on the life and journey undertaken by Amir, the protagonist. Hosseini expresses essential ideas in his novel through the themes of redemption/atonement, the relationship between father and son and lastly, the theme of degradation/discrimination. The author expresses these themes through the setting and characterization. Hosseini presents characters from different social status in Afghanistan and how this affected their childhood. Amir despite coming from a privileged class had to work hard for his atonement by going back to Afghanistan to face his demons as well as to mend his relationship with his father who had rejected him since his birth. On the other hand, Hassan, from the minority class suffered because of his social status after he was abused and mistreated by those in power. The Kite Runner is a story about two boys who grew up in different worlds because of the presence of various social classes in