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The Kite RunnerRevisionContext:Kite fighting had always been a traditional sport in Afghanistan until it was banned by Talban in 1991. It was returned when Taliban was overthrown in 2001. Symbolism:Pomegranate tree Reading and booksShahnamah, Sohrab and Rostam story Kites Green Dreams of Hassan Amir Assef Hassan Sohrab Soraya Afghanistan America Sickness Analysis:Realistic style Coming of age story – bildungsroman Themes – friendship, loyalty, lies, redemption, effects of guiltKite running – represents freedom, lack of oppression; ironicAmerica – Amir has not gained freedom when he entered AmericaChildlike language, fewer metaphors, more clear when describing his childhood. Unreliable narrator. The characters – Assef, Amir, Hassan – may represent the microcosm of groups of people and what was happening in Afghanistan as whole. There are many incidences where children are either threatened or actually hurt. The vulnerability of children is a recurring motif. Hassan – almost perfect/idealistic character – respectful, loyal, hopeful brave; restoration of the whole house and have died protecting it while himself never living in it; perhaps this his flaw, but at times he seems to be more aware of the ethical problems than other people seen from Rahim Khan’s and Amir’s narratives. Some critics link him to Christ. Chapter 1:p.1 I became what I am today at the age of twelve (defining moment), on a frigid overcast day in the winter (first associations of Western readers is negative setting) of 1975.” “crumbling mud wall, peeking into the alley ( near the frozen creek.”“Because the past claws its way out.” – cannot run away from the past. “I realize I have been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years.” – Amir’s life hasn’t changed, he hasn’t grown up. “It was my past of unatoned sins.”“Golden Gate Park” – San Francisco, America, establishes the setting of present day. p.2 “Hassan the harelipped kite runner.” – his memory is linked to the kites. Establishes the name of the title is linked to him. Shows that his physicality is more linked to his memory than his personality, perhaps because Amir was young that is what he remembers or understood most about him. Willow tree – if a mythological reference, than represent life, magic and power as willows live near water. Chapter 2:p.3 Poplar trees – “almost perfectly round face, a face like a Chinese doll chiselled from hardwood: his flat, brad nose and slanting, narrow eyes like bamboo leaves…gold, green, even sapphire…tiny low-set ears and that pointed stub of a chin, a meaty appendage that looked like it was added as a mere afterthought. And the cleft lip…maker’s instrument may have slipped, or perhaps he had simply grown tired and careless (creates the idea of uninmportance).” – imperfections told in a negative way, innocent way. Physicality described in great detail. p.4 wealth of Baba’s housep.5 “my mother a smiling young princess in white.”“Baby is holding me, looking tired and grim. I’m in his arms, but it’s Rahim Khan’s pinky my fingers are curled around.” – summarise of their friendship, introduction p.6 “Hassan and I parted ways.” p.7 “Ali, a man who had memorized the Koran”“Ali had a congenital paralysis or his lower facial muscles, a condition that rendered him unable to smile and left him perpetually grim-faced.”p.8-9 Hazaras and Pashtuns relationship explained. Also shows that his mother was raised up differently than Amir in terms of these relations. p.10 “even in birth, Hassan was true to his nature: He was incapable of hurting anyone.” “Out he came smiling.” – optimism, something Ali could not do. “there was a brotherhood between people who had fed from the same breast, a kingship that not eve time could break.”p.10-11 “Mine was Baba. His was Amir.” – first words of Hassan and Amir. Chapter 3:In this chapter Baba is described in a very idolised way – wrestled a bear (p12); build an orphanage who he has designed while not being an architect (p.13); he became a businessman despite people believing he should become a lawyer as his father, even “becoming one of the richest merchants in Kabul” (this also introduces the cultural theme of like father like son); married Sofia Akrami who was “highly educated woman universally regarded as one of Kabuls most respected, beautiful, and virtuous ladies…she teach classic Farsi literature at the university, she was a descendant of the royal family”, causing Baba to rub in playfully by “referring to her as “my princess.”” (p.15) p.13 – establishes Amir’s envy of Baba’s likeness of Hassan over him which is key in the novel, in the incident of skimming stones. Hassan had eight and Amir managed at the most five. “Baba was there, watching, and he patted Hassan on the back. Even put his arm around his shoulder.” p.14 cultural differences – “longhaired, bearded tourists”, “yellow-haired”p.15 “Baba saw the world black and white. And he got to decide what was black and what was white.” – key theme, are there grey areas? Does Amir see him wrong? p.16 “pair of tree trunks”p.17 Baba’s ultimate sin is theft. “Every other sin is a variation of theft.”“They do nothing but thumb their prayer beads and recite a book written in a tongue they don’t even understand…God help us all if Afghanistan ever fall into their hands.” He is drinking as he said this. “I already hated all the kids he was building orphanage for; sometimes I wished they all died along with their parents.”p.18 “I was always learning things about Baba from other people.”“If there’s a God out there, then I would hope he has more important things to attend to than my drinking scotch or eating pork.” p.19 “That was how I escaped my father’s aloofness, in my dead mother’s books (establishes symbol of mother with books and as a comforting and love gesture). That and Hassan, of course.”p.19 This chapter also establishes that Amir is not athletic, he is more like mother, while Hassan from the previous chapter we know he is, therefore more like Baba and this is part of Amir’s envy. p.20 Henry Kissinger – national security, adviser for America – image of American, being a hero. p.20-p.22 – black and white view of Baba, differences between Baba and Amir “I know, I know. But he’s always buried in those books or shuffling around the house like he’s lost in some dream.”“And?”“I wasn’t like that.” Baba sounded frustrated, almost angry.Rahim Khan laughed. “Children aren’t coloring books. You don’t get to fill them with your favorite colors.”“I’m telling you,” Baba said, “I wasn’t like that at all, and neither were any of the kids I grew up with.”“You know, sometimes you are the most self-centered man I know,” Rahim Khan said. He was the only person I knew who could get away with saying something like that to Baba.…“So he’s not violent,” Rahim Khan said.“That’s not what I mean, Rahim, and you know it,” Baba shot back. “There is something missing in that boy.”“Yes, a mean streak.”“Self-defense has nothing to do with meanness. You know what always happens when the neighborhood boys tease him? Hassan steps in and fends them off. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. And when they come home, I say to him, ‘How did Hassan get that scrape on his face?’ And he says, ‘He fell down.’ I’m telling you, Rahim, there is something missing in that boy.”“You just need to let him find his way,” Rahim Khan said.“And where is he headed?” Baba said. “A boy who won’t stand up for himself becomes a man who can’t stand up to anything.”“As usual you’re oversimplifying.”“I don’t think so.”…“Look, I know there’s a fondness between you and him and I’m happy about that. Envious, but happy. I mean that. He needs someone who… understands him, because God knows I don’t. But something about Amir troubles me in a way that I can’t express. It’s like…” I could see him searching, reaching for the right words. He lowered his voice, but I heard him anyway. “If I hadn’t seen the doctor pull him out of my wife with my own eyes, I’d never believe he’s my son.” Chapter 4:p.23-24 Hassan and Amir; Baba and Ali – parallel to each other. p.24 But in none of his stories did Baba ever refer to Ali as his friend.The curious thing was, I never thought of Hassan and me as friends either. Not in the usual sense, anyhow. Never mind that…(repetition in different scenarios)…Never mind any of those things. Because history isn’t easy to overcome. Neither is religion. In the end, I was a Pashtun and he was a Hazara, I was Sunni and he was Shi’a, and nothing was ever going to change that. Nothing.Hassan will do what Amir will tell him to do. Power differences. Insect torture – elements of crueltyLinks to America – cowboys, ninjas p.25 American movies Pomegranate tree Tree – symbol of their friendship; entrance to the cemetery, foreshadows that it would not last; symbol of knowledge and symbol that Amir is restraining that knowledge under that tree, paradoxical effect; red-blood fruits, foreshadows what happens. Pomegranate – in Muslim religion represents path to redemption, but what Amir is doing can be classed as opposite of that, deceit, bullying. Amir reading to Hassan is parallel to his mother and his wife being a teacher, but he is not teaching Hassan. He is withholding knowledge, and sometimes uses it against him; keeping power over him. Also to decrease his envy as he is better at something than he is. Introduces stories, which is a central motif. Amir reads stories to Hassan and Amir writes stories and later novels. The author himself is a writer. Reading creates a bond between Hassan and Amir, and allows Amir to express his emotions, however, also allows him to bully Hassan. - p.27 “That Hassan would grow up illiterate like Ali and most Hazaras had been decided the minute he had been born, perhaps even the moment he had been conceived in Sanaubar’s unwelcoming womb – after all, what use did a servant have for the written word? But despite his illiteracy, or maybe because of it, Hassan was drawn to the mystery of words, seduced by a secret world forbidden to him (similar to Handmaids). I read him poems and stories, sometimes riddles – though I stopped reading those when I saw he was far better at solving them than I was(shows that Hassan is clever, creative thinking, logical – because of his background a potential of his is prevented/constrained by society, protest). So I read him unchallenging things, like the misadventures of the bumbling Mullah Nasruddin and his donkey.”Amir teases him not knowing the word “imbecile”. “It means smart, intelligent. I’ll use it in a sentence for you, ‘When it comes to words, Hassan is an imbecile.’”p.27-8 Hassan’s favourite book was the Shahnamah, their favourite story from it was Rostam and Sohrab, which parallel to Baba and Amir’s story. p.28 Amir’s another trick is changing the story. Hassan says that this is the best story he ever read and from the story the reader knows that Hassan does things to please Amir, therefore is he saying this because he is aware or Amir is such good story teller, which is why he is a good writer? Also Amir is happy when Hassan compliments his story, so perhaps he is aware of this? “Words were a secret doorways and I held all the keys.” p.30 “Most days I worshiped Baba with an intensity approaching the religious. But right then, I wished I could open my veins and drain his cursed blood from my body.”p.32 ?“Then he paused, as if on the verge of adding something. He weighed his words and cleared his throat. “But will you permit me to ask a question about the story?” he said shyly… “Well…” he started, broke off.” – shows the power gap “Well,” he said, “if I may ask, why did the man kill his wife? In fact, why did he ever have to feel sad to shed tears? Couldn’t he have just smelled an onion?” (logical approach)I was stunned. That particular point, so obvious it was utterly stupid, hadn’t even occurred to me. I moved my lips soundlessly. It appeared that on the same night I had learned about one of writing’s objectives, irony, I would also be introduced to one of its pitfalls: the Plot Hole. Taught by Hassan, of all people. Hassan who couldn’t read and had never written a single word in his entire life. A voice, cold and dark, suddenly whispered in my ear,?What does he know, that illiterate Hazara? He’ll never be anything but a cook. How dare he criticize you?” (resentful, feels insulted, sees Hassan as inferior to him lower status. Uses his ethnicity against him) Chapter 5:p.33-34 “The shootings and explosions had lasted less than an hour, but they had frightened us badly, because none of us had ever heard gunshots in the streets. They were foreign sounds to us then. The generation of Afghan children whose ears would know nothing but the sounds of bombs and gunfire was not yet born.”?p. 33 “like thunder” – start of Soviet War. Sibilance, sinister feelJealousy of Ali’s love of Hassan, wishes the same from his dadp. 34 Baba feels fear – war has an immediate effectp. 35 Why does Hassan wants to visit the tree? For Hassan the tree represent their friendship and unity p.36 “Years later, I learned an English word for the creature that Assef was, a word for which a good Farsi equivalent does not exist: “sociopath.”” – shows perhaps violence is part of normality and culture of Afghanistan. This also would explain to Western audiences Assef behaviour and place him as the ‘villain’ in this story. p.37 “I wondered if anyone would hear us scream in this remote patch of land.” – perhaps represents the remoteness of Afghanistan and asking for help Assef talked to his mother about Hitler, insensitive, part of sociopath characteristics. In greater context – children may not understand what is happening, see it as a story, because they did not experience it. In greater context, that is perhaps how the West would view Afghanistan – they would misunderstand it as they have not lived through it or see it more of a story. Assef’s character also runs parallel to Adolf Hitler (a person who is familiar to Western audiences), which is why perhaps Hosseini made him Assef’s idol – though they both apparently attempted to make their country better in their own views, both can be considered partially outsiders. Assef has a German mother, which made him blond, blue-eyed and taller than other kids. They both wanted to remove a population which was not a majority with similar motifs. p.38 “Afghanistan is the land of Pashtuns. It always has been, always will be. We are the true Afghans, the pure Afghans, not this Flat-Nose here. His people pollute our homeland, our?watan. They dirty our blood…Afghanistan for Pashtuns, I say. That’s my vision.”p.39 Hassan’s slingshot – may represent his resistance of oppression. It also may represent his loyalty to Amir and so perhaps the cause of his death/downfall. “He’d referred to Assef as “Agha,” and I wondered briefly what it must be like to live with such an ingrained sense of one’s place in a hierarchy.”Harelips – in some cultures seen as a curse. The removal should remove this curse. In this book it seems that the is a symbol of bond, a symbol of Hassan and a symbol of redemption of Amir. p.41 “Baba never missed Hassan’s birthday.”?Why Baba wants harelip corrected? – shows Baba’s affection; sees Hassan as not perfect; Hassan grateful to anything. p.43 “I wished I too had some kind of scar that would beget Baba’s sympathy. It wasn’t fair. Hassan hadn’t done anything to earn Baba’s affections; he’d just been born with that stupid harelip.”p. 44 “By the following winter, it was only a faint scar. Which was ironic. Because that was the winter that Hassan stopped smiling.”Chapter 6:In this chapter we see Hassan being more athletic than Amir and introduced to the idea of Hassan being a very good kit runner. p.50 “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.” – is Amir better than Assef or worse? p.51 “And that’s the thing about people who mean everything they say. They think everyone else does too.”“IN THE WINTER OF 1975, I saw Hassan run a kite for the last time.”p.52-53 “But coming close wasn’t the same as winning, was it? Baba hadn’t?come close. He had won because winners won and everyone else just went home. Baba was used to winning, winning at everything he set his mind to. Didn’t he have a right to expect the same from his son? And just imagine. If I did win…Show him once and for all that his son was worthy. Then maybe my life as a ghost in this house would finally be over…Maybe he’d call me?Amir jan?like Rahim Khan did. And maybe, just maybe, I would finally be pardoned for killing my mother.”p.54 “Sad for who Hassan was, where he lived. For how he’d accepted the fact that he’d grow old in that mud shack in the yard, the way his father had.”“He was so goddamn pure, you always felt like a phony around him.”p.55 “I’d won, but as I shuffled for a new game, I had the distinct suspicion that Hassan had?let?me win.”Chapter 7:p. 53-54 Hassan’s dream is significant as it shows about his subconscious. It shows his trust and loyalty to Amir. Amir juxtaposition of Hassan. Amir – negative; Hassan – positive. p.63 “He was already turning the street corner, his rubber boots kicking up snow. He stopped, turned. He cupped his hands around his mouth. “For you a thousand times over! (repeated phrase throughout the novel, symbol of his guilt and Hassan’s loyalty to Amir)” he said. Then he smiled his Hassan smile and disappeared around the corner. The next time I saw him smile unabashedly(stop smiling) like that was twenty-six years later, in a faded Polaroid photograph (foreshadows what is to come, decrease happy mood of winning).”p.64 “Rostam and Sohrab sizing each other up. A dramatic moment of silence. Then the old warrior would walk to the young one, embrace him, acknowledge his worthiness. Vindication. Salvation. Redemption. And then? Well… happily ever after, of course. What else?” p.65 “He was going to miss prayer tonight, though, because of me.”There is juxtaposition of tournament/winning/happiness and attack/sadness/pain means that the act of winning is immediately contrasted with the act of losing, perhaps overshadowing it. The boys lost their innocence, Amir begins his strings of lies (or has he always lied but this is the most impactful), self-respect, sleep (for Amir), friend (for both). During the rape Amir’s narrative breaks off to talk about the memories between Hassan and Amir – shows how traumatic it is for him to talk. The setting of Hassan’s rape is a dark alleyway – this shows perhaps that it is symbolically hidden in their minds or from people in their lives. p.68 “A loyal Hazara. Loyal as a dog,” Assef said.p.71 “Hassan didn’t struggle. Didn’t even whimper. He moved his head slightly and I caught a glimpse of his face. Saw the resignation in it. It was a look I had seen before. It was the look of the lamb.”Blood and tears from both Amir and Hassan. Hosseini is focusing on Amir rather than Hassan. Perhaps because it is pivotal point in the novel, or perhaps to show that in this story guilt is more impactful than being a victim. p.72-73 “I ran because I was a coward. I was afraid of Assef and what he would do to me. I was afraid of getting hurt. That’s what I told myself as I turned my back to the alley, to Hassan. That’s what I made myself believe. I actually?aspired?to cowardice, because the alternative, the real reason I was running, was that Assef was right: Nothing was free in this world. Maybe Hassan was the price I had to pay, the lamb I had to slay, to win Baba. Was it a fair price? The answer floated to my conscious mind before I could thwart it: He was just a Hazara, wasn’t he?”Chapter 8:According to Koran, pomegranates are one of the fruits that Muslims will find in the garden of paradise supposed to be a curve for envy and hatred.Hassan refuses to fight back when Amir attacks him with the pomegranates; this can be linked to the prophet saying: ‘There should be neither harming nor reciprocating harm.’ Evidence of Amir’s guilt: p.75 “a breakfast I hardly finished anymore.”p.78 Rahim Khan – voice of reason, his guilt hiding at the back of his mind. p.79 the images keep coming back to himp.80 “Except now that I had it, I felt empty as this unkempt pool”He feels like he was a ‘monster’, he felt like he killed Hassan. “But no one woke up and in the silence that followed, I understood the nature of my new curse: I was going to get away with it.”p. 81 He cannot sleep. Like Macbeth, perhaps. “There was a monster in the lake. It had grabbed Hassan by the ankles, dragged him to the murky bottom. I was that monster.That was the night I became an insomniac.”Going away from the tree – guilt, the tree did not cure his envy or hatred. p.82 isolation, including Hassan who reminds him of his guilt. Physical pains – headache. He wants to be hurt like Hassan was. p.83 Trouble breathing when Hassan is there. “Because when he was around, the oxygen seeped out of the room. My chest tightened and I couldn’t draw enough air; I’d stand there, gasping in my own little airless bubble of atmosphere. But even when he wasn’t around, he was. He was there in the hand-washed and ironed clothes on the cane-seat chair, in the warm slippers left outside my door, in the wood already burning in the stove when I came down for breakfast. Everywhere I turned, I saw signs of his loyalty, his goddamn unwavering loyalty.”p.85 blaming himself, “what I had let happened.”p.86 “I might as well have taken a knife and carved those lines myself.” Pomegranites – red – blood – reminded of what happened. Amir says that Hassan is a coward when in reality it is Amir who is. p.91-92 – Rahim Khan story of his love who was a Hazara, Homaira. The prejudice and gives idea to Amir to send Hassan away. He wants to protect Hassan from Assef, but also from himself. And I’ll tell you this, Amir jan: In the end, the world always wins. That’s just the way of things.”…“Probably for the best, though,” Rahim Khan said, shrugging. “She would have suffered. My family would have never accepted her as an equal. You don’t order someone to polish your shoes one day and call them ‘sister’ the next.”p.93 “In one of those brief bursts of light, I saw something I’ll never forget: Hassan serving drinks to Assef and Wali from a silver platter. The light winked out, a hiss and a crackle, then another flicker of orange light: Assef grinning, kneading Hassan in the chest with a knuckle.Then, mercifully, darkness.”Chapter 9:This a pivotal point - changes of lives and attitudes, impact Contains deceit, lies. Splitting of people - no longer work together - political and social protest Change in Hassan and Amir and Baba and Ali Stooping, pleading, reversed rolesp.94 “blood money” - have not helped Hassan, Baba’s lack of unconditional love to Amir“like a candy apple. Or blood.” - sees blood everywhere, guilts surrounds him in everywherep.95 “A thank you, but only a halfhearted one” - change in attitude “...Rahim Khan’s leather-bound notebook. That was the only that did not feel like blood money.” - unconditional love p.96 The book Shahnamah significance/symbolism - friendship of Amir and Hassan; used this book to manipulate Hassan so alludes to abuse; their favourite story is about lack of unconditional love; selfless gift as this is a gift they could not use; Amir’s guilt. p.98 “Then I understood: This was Hassan’s final sacrifice for me...And that led to another understanding: Hassan knew.” - he knew about how Amir did not save him, but he also may have understood that Amir wants to please/be appreciated by Baba. “the monster in the lake” - reference to Hassan’s dream Baba’s forgiveness of Hassan. p.98-100 - shows impact and destruction of Amir’s guilt: “the color draining from his face” B“a sheen of grief across his face” B“That was when i understood the depth of the pain I had caused, the blackness of the grief I had brought onto everyone, that not even Ali’s paralysed face could mask his sorrow.”“His voice was breaking.” He cried. It scared me a little, seeing a grown man sob. Fathers weren't supposed to cry….I’ll never forget the way baba said that (“Please”), the pain in his plea, the fear.” Pathetic fallacy of violencep.100 “the sun like a branding iron searing the back of your neck.”(not face, hiding)“sweating”, “tongue-twisting”“Thunderheads rolled in, painted the sky iron gray.” – anger“sheets of rain were sweeping in, the steady hiss of falling water swelling in my ears.” - sibilance creates a sinister feel; rain and water also represents sadness. “blurry, rain-soaked window”“lone suitcase” Hassan “left all of his toys behind in the empty shack” - loss of innocence and childhoodp.101 “Slithering beads of rain sluiced down my window. “Baba getting soaked, stooping, one arm on the roof of the car. But when he straightened, I saw in his slumping shoulders that the life I had known since i’f been born was over.” “But this was no Hindi movie.” “Melting silver” - ‘melting, hot anger; ‘silver’ importance, goodness, sadness - goodness is melting away; anger and sadness feelings mixed ?Chapter 10:The narration in this chapter is more broken, more shifts in time, not one memory, seems more of a mixture, like he is patching it together. Baba sees Amir’s car sickness as a weakness. It is a symbol of Baba’s disappointment of Amir. p.103 “As if car sickness was a crime. As if you weren’t supposed to get sick when you were eighteen.” Time sifts – not significant to the story; he tries to forget his guilt; significant as Hassan is not with them. p.104 – Soviet union impact on community – mistrust between people, children spying on their parents; separated by fear. p.105 – Amir thinks of Hassan when throwing up. p.106 – “The laughing man broke into song, a slurring, off-key rendition of an old Afghan wedding song, delivered with a thick Russian accent” – mixing of cultures, lack of disrespect of other cultures shown by the contrast/irony of the description of his voice. Baba presented in this chapter as heroic and strong, and provides contrast to Amir. This can be clearly seen in Baba’s response of the Russian soldier wanting to rape a woman on p.107-108 compare to Amir. Amir is fearing for Baba’s safety while Baba is standing up for something moral and just; or standing up against the invaders or the state (political and social protest writing). Amir thinks of the incident with Hassan, also rape but where he does not do anything and questions whether he is really Baba’s son. p.107-108That was when Baba stood up. It was my turn to clamp a hand on his thigh, but Baba pried it loose, snatched his leg away. When he stood, he eclipsed the moonlight. “I want you to ask this man something,” Baba said. He said it to Karim, but looked directly at the Russian officer. “Ask him where his shame is.”They spoke. “He says this is war. There is no shame in war.”“Tell him he’s wrong. War doesn’t negate decency. It?demands?it, even more than in times of peace.”Do you have to always be the hero??I thought, my heart fluttering.?Can’t you just let it go for once??But I knew he couldn’t – it wasn’t in his nature. The problem was, his nature was going to get us all killed.The Russian soldier said something to Karim, a smile creasing his lips. “Agha sahib,” Karim said, “these?Roussi?are not like us. They understand nothing about respect, honor.”“What did he say?”“He says he’ll enjoy putting a bullet in you almost as much as…” Karim trailed off, but nodded his head toward the young woman who had caught the guard’s eye. The soldier flicked his unfinished cigarette and unholstered his handgun.?So this is where Baba dies, I thought.?This is how it’s going to happen. In my head, I said a prayer I had learned in school.“Tell him I’ll take a thousand of his bullets before I let this indecency take place,” Baba said. My mind flashed to that winter day six years ago. Me, peering around the corner in the alley. Kamal and Wali holding Hassan down. Assef’s buttock muscles clenching and unclenching, his hips thrusting back and forth. Some hero I had been, fretting about the kite. Sometimes, I too wondered if I was really Baba’s son.The bulldog-faced Russian raised his gun.“Baba, sit down please,” I said, tugging at his sleeve. “I think he really means to shoot you.”Baba slapped my hand away. “Haven’t I taught you anything?” he snapped. He turned to the grinning soldier. “Tell him he’d better kill me good with that first shot. Because if I don’t go down, I’m tearing him to pieces, goddamn his father!”The Russian soldier’s grin never faltered when he heard the translation. He clicked the safety on the gun. Pointed the barrel to Baba’s chest. Heart pounding in my throat, I buried my face in my hands.The gun roared.It’s done, then. I’m eighteen and alone. I have no one left in the world. Baba’s dead and now I have to bury him. Where do I bury him? Where do I go after that?But the whirlwind of half thoughts spinning in my head came to a halt when I cracked my eyelids, found Baba still standing. I saw a second Russian officer with the others. It was from the muzzle of his upturned gun that smoke swirled. The soldier who had meant to shoot Baba had already holstered his weapon. He was shuffling his feet. I had never felt more like crying and laughing at the same time.The second Russian officer, gray-haired and heavyset, spoke to us in broken Farsi. He apologized for his comrade’s behavior. “Russia sends them here to fight,” he said. “But they are just boys, and when they come here, they find the pleasure of drug.” He gave the younger officer the rueful look of a father exasperated with his misbehaving son. “This one is attached to drug now. I try to stop him…” He waved us off.Moments later, we were pulling away. I heard a laugh and then the first soldier’s voice, slurry and off-key, singing the old wedding song.Darkness in basement imagery, entrapment p.112-113 Panic scene in the fire truck, claustrophobic, darkness – light is saviourp.114-115 Death of Kamal, corresponds to them crossing the border – pushes Amir to think about redemption; revenge for Hassan, karma, Kamal was also raped and also has died, but at the hands of other invaders of Afghanistan; Amir unable to leave home or his guilt, past life. Karim – potentially Amir first witnessing closed-death “I’ll never forget the echo of that blast. Or the flash of light and the spray of red.” Chapter 11:“Baba loved the idea of America./It was living in America that gave him an ulcer.”p.117-p.121 – life in Afghanistan vs life in America – the food, the job, the traditions e.g. showing ID, refusing welfare money. It also shows that Amir was able to thrive in America while Baba did not. p.119 “Baba was like the widower who remarries but can’t let go of his dead wife.”p.118 “For me, America was a place to bury my memories./For Baba, a place to mourn his.” “Peshawar was good for me. Not good for you.”p.121 “Bab walked out of the welfare office like a man cured of a tumor.”p.125 – change in Amir in attitude with his dad.“But I would stand my ground, I decided. I didn’t want to sacrifice for Baba anymore. The last time I had done that, I had damned myself.” p.124 “A pair of steal hands closed around by windpipe at the sound of Hassan’s name. I rolled down the window. Waiter for the steel hands to loosen their grip.”p.126 “…I was still marvelling at the size of this country, its vastness. Beyond every freeway lay another freeway, beyond every city another city, hills beyond mountains and mountains beyond hills, and, beyond those, more cities and more people.Long before the Roussi army marched into Afghanistan, long before villages were burned and schools destroyed, long before mines were planted like seeds of death (life and death contrast) and children buried in rock-piled graves, Kabul had become a city of ghost for me. A city of harelipped ghosts (guilt relating to Hassan). America was different. America was a river, roaring along, unmindful of the past. I could wade into this river, let my sins down to the bottom, le the waters carry me someplace far. Someplace with no ghosts, no memories, and no sins.If for nothing else, for that, I embraced America.”p.127-128 – San Jose flee market – section with Afghan families, meeting place, sticking together, cultural p.128 General Sahib, Mr. Iqbal Taheri introduction p.129 “Will you be writing about our country, history perhaps? Economics?...Well, people need storied to divert them at difficult times like this.” “I have heard many men foolishly labelled great. But your father has the distinction of belonging to the minority who truly deserves the label.’ This little speech sounded to me the way his suit looked: often used and unnaturally shiny.”p.129-130 “…wishing he’d not call me ‘my child.’/ ‘Then congratulations, you are already halfway to being a man,’ he said with no trace of humour, no irony, the compliment of the casually arrogant.” “lke the arched wings of a flying bird (freedom, ironical), and the gracefully hooked noise fo a princess from old Persia – maybe that of Tahmineh, Rostam’s wife and Sohrab’s mother from the Shahnamah.” – link to the book that link to Hassan. Amir also refers to Soraya as a princess like his father did to his mother. p.131 “It may be unfair, but what happens in a dew days, sometimes even a single day, can change the course of a whole lifetime, Amir.” Amir can relate to this.Soraya Taheri is one of few female characters in the novel and the most prominent. She has the same name as a former queen of Afghanistan, the wife of King Amanullan khan and an early and powerful champion of women’s rights in Afghanistan. Soraya, like Amir is a child of an influential powerful and well-regarded man. Soraya is symbolically a mirror (can be related to Handmaid’s theme of doubles), reflecting Amir own life and his past and character. But in some ways Soraya as seem from the following chapters is what Amir should have been, and so provides a contrast in response to the same events.Chapter 12:p.134 “‘The man is a Pastun to the root (are Hazaras not?). He had nang and namos.’ Nang. Namos. Honor and pride. The tents of Pashtun men. Especially when it came to the chastity of a wife. Or a daughter.”p.135 “Poison tongues would flap. And she would bear the brunt of that poison, not me – I was fully aware of the Afghan double standard that favoured my gender.” “By Afghan standards, my question had been bod. With it, I had bared myself, and left little doubt as to my interest in her. But I was a man, and all I had risked was a bruised ego. Bruises healed. Reputations did not.” p.136 “embarrassed, as I often was around Afghans, that she knew me and I had no idea who she was.” p.137 “Afghan men, especially those from reputable families, were fickle creatures. A whisper here, an insinuation there, and they fled like startled birds.” p.139-140 Soraya teaches her servants Ziba to read and write as well as reading to her as Amir has done to Hassan. It shows that she does not abuse her power as Amir has done. However, he situation is slightly different – she has both of her parents, her relationship with her father may be different, she may have felt different pressures due to her genre and social expectations. Perhaps her lesser power as a woman taught her to give power to others, similar to Hassan teaching Sohrab how to read. Soraya’s mother was a teacher who has taught girls, so she may have influenced or taught Soraya to give people power or education who do not have it. Baba ill health – him getting lung cancer, can be a symbol of him feeling home sick or away from Afghanistan. p.144 “Don’t challenge me in public, Amir. Ever. Who do you think you are?” Amir has not yet grown or Baba expects too much of him?“What about me, Baba? What am I supposed to do?” I said, my eyes welling up.A look of disgust swept across his rain-soaked face. It was the same look he’d give me when, as a kid, I’d fall, scrape my knees, and cry. It was the crying that brought it on then, the crying that brought it on now. “You’re twenty-two years old, Amir! A grown man! You…” he opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again, reconsidered. Above us, rain drummed on the canvas awning. “What’s going to happen to you, you say? All those years, that’s what I was trying to teach you, how to never have to ask that question.”p.147 “I remembered something Baba had said about Pashtuns once. We may be hardheaded and I know we’re far too proud, but, in the hour of need, believe me that there’ no one you’d rather have at your side than a Pashtun.” p.146 “pointed with the eraser end of his pencil to the pictures of Baba’s cancer, like a cop showing mug shots of the killer to the victim’s family.” p.147 “I wept in the hallway, by the viewing box where, the night before, I’d seen the killer’s face.” – perhaps shows his guilt of Baba’s dying, blames himself. Perhaps with this episode of cancer that leads eventually to Baba’s death, Hosseini is trying to show that Amir’s flaw is blaming himself for things that perhaps he cannot fully control, as the reader would understand that as a child, Amir probably would able to do little about the rape, though acknowledge he is in part is at fault. p.149 “Baba’s dry lips stretched into a smile. A spot of green on a wilted lead.”Amir’s reaction while Baba is calling, is similar as during the rape, may simply show that he is simply anxious. “I wanted to laugh for some reason. Or scream. I brought the ball of my hand to my mouth and bit on it. Baba laughed softly through his nose (is not interpreted as bad). p.149-150 “I thought of all the empty spaces Baba would leave behind when he was gone…too much of baba had melted away to fill it anymore...Baba was hobbling up the Taheris’ driveway for one last fatherly duty.” Amir able to overlook Soraya’s past may suggest that his guilt made him aware that other people can make mistakes and are not prefer. He also may see what he has done is far worse – the extent of his guilt is shown. It also shows the gender social expectations and traditions – theme. p.137, p.151-2 (Soraya tells Amir of her past). p.152 “I envied her. Her secret was out. Spoken. Dealt with. I opened my mouth and almost told her how I’d betrayed Hassan, lied, driven him out, and destroyed a forty-year relationship between Baba and Ali. But I didn’t. I suspected there were many ways in which Soraya Taheri was a better person than me. Courage was just one of them.”Chapter 13:throughout this chapter there are many success and go with failuresThe first part of the chapter deals with the wedding between Amir and Soraya, and can be labelled as a success and defiantly hopeful from Amir’s perspective.p.156 “Soraya and I dressed in green – the color of Islam, but also the color of spring and new beginnings.” The wedding is described in pieces of memories. The author may have done this to save explanation or perhaps show that other things occupied Amir’s mind like his dying father or even potentially Hassan. p.158 “And I remember wondering if Hassan too had married. And if so, whose face he had seen in the mirror under the veil? Who henna-painted hands had he held?”p.158-159 – Baba becomes more accepting of Amir and him writing stories or realising as he does not have much time he should accept before it’s too late p.159-160 – the description of Baba’s death is very peaceful.“Baba had wrestled bears his whole life. Losing his young wife. Raising a son by himself. Leaving his beloved homeland, his watan. Poverty. Indignity. In the end, a bear had come he couldn’t beat. But even then, he had lost on his own terms.” – make Baba’s death sound heroic and his life hard and heroic. p.161 –Amir’s loss of his identity after Baba’s death:“I realised how much of who I was, what I was, had been defined by baba and the marks he had left on people’s lives. My whole life, I had been “Baba’s son.” Now he was gone. Baba couldn’t show me the way anymore; I’d have to find it on my own.”“Set in the shade of the red maple.” “Life moving on already, leaving Baba behind.”p.162-163 – the reader learns more about Taheri family, potentially contrasting with Baba’s, and Afghan rules and traditions. p.164 “I had relieved her of the greatest fear of every Afghan mother; that no honorable khastegar would ask for her daughter’s hand. That he daughter would age alone, husbandless, childless. Every woman need a husband. Even if he did silence the song in her.”p.164 “Their sons go out to nightclubs looking for meat and get their girlfriends pregnant, they have kids out of wedlock and no one says a goddamn thing. Oh, they’re just men having fun! I make one mistake and suddenly everyone is talking?nang?and?namoos, and I have to have my face rubbed in it for the rest of my life.” p.165-6 “As I drove, I wondered why I was different. Maybe it was because I had been raised by men; I hadn’t grown up around women and had never been exposed first hand to the double standard with which Afghan society sometimes treated them. Maybe it was because Baba had been such an unusual Afghan father, a liberal who had lived by his own rules, a maverick who had disregarded or embraced societal customs as he had seen fit.But I think a big part of the reason I didn’t care about Soraya’s past was that I had one of my own. I knew all about regret.”p.167 – Soraya, teaching and her father p.167-169When Amir published his first book, summer 1988, the Soviet armies pull out of Afghanistan, as USSR collapsed, fall of Berlin Wall and end of the Cold War. Amir publishes his first book, Russian soldiers left. There is success in that. This is contrasted with Hassan’s words and so his failure. “There were so much goodness in my life. So much happiness. I wondered whether I deserved any of it.” The novel released in the summer of 1989, another success, while the war in Afghanistan continues. Rather than allow Afghanistan to re-establish peace, leaders of militia established themselves as warlords within their own ears of control, civil war continued Amir and Soraya are trying to have a baby and failure.“What sort of father would I make, I wondered. I wanted to be just like Baba and I wanted to be nothing like him.” p.172 “Blood is a powerful thing, bachem, never forget that.” “Blood is a powerful thing, bachem, and when you adopt, you don’t know whose blood you’re bringing into your house.” Importance of your ancestors in marriage; contrasted with America. Also later can be linked to Sohrab. p.173 – Amir blames his sins for not having a child. Shows the extent of his guilt. Amir sells his second book and Soraya and he buy a house. p.173-174 – personification of childless, but is there, a real thing, perhaps foreshadowing of Sohrab. “And I could almost feel the emptiness in Soraya’s womb, like it was a living, breathing thing. It had seeped into our marriage, that emptiness, into our laughs, and our lovemaking. And late at night, in the darkness of our room, I’d feel it rising from Soraya and settling between us. Sleeping between us. Like a newborn child.”Chapter 14:p.175 Structurally significant, this continues from the call from chapter one and in the centre of the book. Rahim Khan – represents consciousness, theme of forgiveness – to redeem yourself you required to accept what you have done, theme of acceptance. He is also a pivotal character, valued by Amir, represents the perfect parent from Amir’s eyes. “Come. There is way to be good again.” – appears many times in the novel and its repetition reinforces the idea of atonement. p.177p.178 – the relationship between Soraya and her father has improved. He sometimes would come to her classes, shows that he is proud of her. Happened only when his health decreased, similar to Baba. p.178 “THAT NIGHT, Soraya and I lay in bed, her back pressed to my chest, my face buried in her hair. I remembered when we used to lay forehead to forehead, sharing afterglow kisses and whispering until our eyes drifted closed, whispering about tiny, curled toes, first smiles, first words, first steps. We still did sometimes, but the whispers were about school, my new book, a giggle over someone’s ridiculous dress at a party. Our lovemaking was still good, at times better than good, but some nights all I’d feel was a relief to be done with it, to be free to drift away and forget, at least for a while, about the futility of what we’d just done. She never said so, but I knew sometimes Soraya felt it too. On those nights, we’d each roll to our side of the bed and let our own savior take us away. Soraya’s was sleep. Mine, as always, was a book.I lay in the dark the night Rahim Khan called and traced with my eyes the parallel silver lines on the wall made by moonlight pouring through the blinds. At some point, maybe just before dawn, I drifted to sleep. And dreamed of Hassan running in the snow, the hem of his green?chapan?dragging behind him, snow crunching under his black rubber boots. He was yelling over his shoulder:?For you, a thousand times over!” Chapter 15: p.183 Taliban, “they don’t let you be human.”p.183-184 “I was old enough to be his grandfather and I was sitting there, blood gushing down my face, apologizing to that son of a dog.” p.184-5 – what happened in Afghanistan, Northern Alliance (warlords, 1992-1996), Taliban. p.185 – Baba’s orphanage was destroyed during the time of the Alliance. As it effects children, it could be argued to be appearing more brutal. The orphanage was Baba’s work and legacy (spent a lot of time, did something for others). Shows lack of safety for childrenCould show that Alliance work not for the people but for themselvesShows how Afghanistan changed, less generosityCould represent Baba’s deathLoss of innocence of children – they have to quickly grown up due to the conditions they live inThe orphanage Baba built to repay Hassan by helping others; its destruction therefore would represent him failing this and so Amir must repay both dees/faults. “hope is a strange thing. Peace at last. But at what price?”p.186 “I see America has infused you with the optimism that has made her so great. That’s very good. We’re melancholic people…”p.187 Amir did not refuse to listen about Hassan, but did not say yes. This can symbolise change but not quite. Chapter 16:This chapter is significant as this the first chapter and one of few times in the novel when someone else other than Amir speaks, Rahim Khan. His views are important about the past because he would remember than as an adult rather than Amir and may give a different perspective to Amir. As well, he is telling this story perhaps to persuade Amir to go to Afghanistan. He many change it also to make it more interesting or to glorify the people as most who he speaks to are dead. This can be supported by the fact that he does not grotesque the tale and leaves some details out, like about death and the war. For example, he does not give detail about how Sanaubar was badly hurt (he even pauses, suggesting that he is thinking how to paint the picture) and her death is described as peaceful, which can be unrealistic. Neither her previously story is told. As Amir trusts Rahim Khan, the reader most likely to trust him as well. lots of sibilance and more religious language. He is a moral man, “Allah, forgive me” repetition of “would” – suggests a more considerate approach to speech, calm tone in spite of the content story culture – exaggeration, making a good storyHassan has named his son Sohrab which links to the story that both Amir and Hassan loved as children, therefore directly linking to Amir and their friendship. This shows that Hassan has forgiven Amir and does not hate. It may show that rape has not affect him or affected him differently to Amir. It may shown that guilt is stronger and more impactful than being a victim. Do children forget quickly? p.190 “bare lemon tree” and “an acacia tree” in Hassan’s yard“I had to make him stop kissing my hands.”“You would have recognised him, Amir jan.” – how true is this? “She was a sky woman, so courteous she spoke in a voice barely higher than a whisper and would not raise her pretty hazel eyes to meet my gaze. But by the way she was looking at Hassan, he might as well have been sitting on the throne at the Arg.” – is he glorifying her and the social-created power dynamic? “I am praying for a boy to carry on my father’s name.” – why did he change his name to Sohrab? p.191 – relationship between Baba and Ali when they were kids.p.192 – the questions Hassan asks perhaps seem quite simplistic and almost childlike – it may show that due to his life he has little to ask else and unable to see America, or show that Amir has kept him as a child. There are other seemingly childlike behaviour – “He wept like a child for the rest of that night.” “Agha sahib was like my second father…God give him peace.” – the change in his decision and this sentence may suggest that Amir has told him before about who was his real father. This may explain of his reaction to the news of Baba’s death. p.192-3 – “He said it was matter of ihtiram, a matter of respect… ‘What will Amir agha think?’ he said to me. ‘What will he think when he comes back to Kabul after the war and finds that I have assumed his place in the house?’ Then, in mourning for your father, Hassan wore black for the next forty days.” – this may show his upbringing and his understanding of his place in society. “Like he was preparing the house for someone’s return.” – one of the examples of optimism present in this chapter. “Outside the walls of that house, there was a war raging. But the three of us, in your father’s house, we made our own little haven from it.”“My vision started going by the late 1980s, so I had Hassan read me your mother’s books. We would sit in the foyer, by the stove, and Hassan would read me from Masnawi or Khayyám...” – change of power, contrast to Amir and Hassan as children. p.194 - Sanaubar accepts Hassan’s smile – perhaps shows optimism“And now…” – pauses, does not want to describe what happened to Sanaubarp.195 “I guess some stories do not need telling.” p.196 – “She lived to see him turn four, and then, one morning, she just did not wake up. She looked calm, at peace, like she did not mind dying now.” – idealistic view of dyingShe was buried in the cemetery “by the pomegranate tree” – she will reach paradise, no anger or envy“The infighting between the factions was fierce and no one knew if they would live to see the end of the day. Our ears became accustomed to the whistle of falling shells, to the rumble of gunfire, our eyes familiar with the sight of men digging bodies out of piles of rubble. Kabul in those days, Amir jan, was as close as you could get to that proverbial hell on earth. Allah was kind to us, though. The Wazir Akbar Khan area was not attacked as much, so we did not have it as bad as some of the other neighborhoods.” p.196-7 Sohrab – was taught by Hassan how to shoot the slingshot, “by the time he was eight, Sohrab had become deadly with that thing…Hassan taught him to read and write – his son was not going to grow up illiterate like he had.” They went kite running. Suggests that there was still some freedom and better than in Taliban times, at least for this family. “I grew very attached to that little boy – I had seen him take his first step, heard him utter his first word.” – who is Amir really getting Sohrab for? Himself or Rahim Khan?Mention of Rahim Khan buying books for Sohrab “and Sohrab read them as quickly as I could get them to him. He reminded me of you, how you loved to read when you were little, Amir jan. Sometimes, I read to him at night, played riddles with him, taught him card tricks(similar what Amir and Hassan did as children). I miss him terribly.Bookstore destroyed – prevents people from thinking, illiterate. Hassan here appears to be more aware of racial discrimination that Rahim Khan or of situation in general. I told you how we all celebrated in 1996 when the Taliban rolled in and put an end to the daily fighting. I remember coming home that night and finding Hassan in the kitchen, listening to the radio. He had a sober look in his eyes. I asked him what was wrong, and he just shook his head. “God help the Hazaras now, Rahim Khan sahib,” he said.“The war is over, Hassan,” I said. “There’s going to be peace,?Inshallah, and happiness and calm. No more rockets, no more killing, no more funerals!” But he just turned off the radio and asked if he could get me anything before he went to bed.A few weeks later, the Taliban banned kite fighting (suggests it was better than before, warning sign of loss of freedom). And two years later, in 1998, they massacred the Hazaras in Mazar-i-Sharif. Chapter 17:p.199 “the man in the chapan exuded a sense of self-assuredness, or ease. It was in the way he stood…Mostly, it was in the way he smiled. Looking at the photo, one might have concluded that this was a man who thought the world have been good to him.” “handwriting was almost childlike in its neatness” – perfectionp.199-202 – this is second time the reader hears another voice instead of Amir and the first time hear Hassan’s thoughts speak. Short sentencesCultural differences between Amir and Hassan’s writing. There is much more religious language and he addresses Amir through the letter continuously.The way he addresses suggests that he still views their relationship was friendly, “Amir agha”p.200 “The streets are full enough already of hungry orphans and every day I thank Allah that I am alive, not because I fear death, but because my wife has a husband and my son is not an orphan.” “I have taught him to read and write so he does not grow up stupid like his father.” p.201 – “Do you remember how we used to sit under the pomegranate tree there and read from the Shahnamah? The droughts have dried the hill and the tree hasn’t borne fruit in years, but Sohrab and I still sit under its shade and I read to him from the Shahnamah. It is not necessarily to tell you that his favourite part is the one with his namesake, Rostam and Sohrab.”p.201-202 – at the end of his letter, Hassan speaks of dreams and previously the reader knows that dreams symbolises or foreshadows reality. The corpses on soccer field may foreshadow what Amir will encounter when he visits Afghanistan. His dreams, how much they foreshadow depends on the interpretation. If Sohrab is an extension of Hassan, than he will meet Hassan. And Sohrab’s future potentially is predicted – the reader knows he will be free and with a good family, may be successful. Some may interpret Hassan’s dreams as too optimistic. p.203 “But all I could manage was to whisper (lack of protest) ‘No. No. No’ (denial, unable to face the facts) over and over again.” “his life of unrequited loyalty drifting from him like the windblown kites he used to chase.” p.204 “Children are fragile, Amir jan. Kabul is already full of broken children and I don’t want Sohrab to become another.” “We can give him a new life here, new hope, with people who would love him.”“I’m, a dying man and I will not be insulted! It has never been about money with me, you that…I think we both why it was to be you…”Amir does not want to go to Afghanistan/Kabul until Rahim Khan mentions Hassan was his half-brother. This perhaps can be linked to culture and how blood is a powerful thing, as well maybe it intensified Amir’s guilt. Hosseini has given a name to an orphan living in Afghanistan to show how children are treated and make it more personal and so intensify the reader’s empathy/sympathy. Chapter 18:p.208 “a thief of the worst kind, because the things he’d stolen had been sacred: from me the right to know I had a brother, from Hassan his identity, and from Ali his honor. His nag. His namoos.” “knowing he had been dishonored by is master in the single worst way an Afghan man can be disnonored?”p.209 – his decision to go back to Afghanistanp.210 – power of blood, fighting Baba “Here is another cliché my creative writing teacher would have scoffed at; like father, like son. But it was true, wasn’t it? As it turned out, Baba and I were more alike than I’d ever known. We had both betrayed the people who would have given their lives for us. And with that came this realization: that Rahim Khan had summoned me here to atone not just for my sins but for Baba’s too.Rahim Khan said I’d always been too hard on myself. But I wondered. True, I hadn’t made Ali step on the land mine, and I hadn’t brought the Taliban to the house to shoot Hassan. But I had driven Hassan and Ali out of the house. Was it too far-fetched to imagine that things might have turned out differently if I hadn’t? Maybe Baba would have brought them along to America. Maybe Hassan would have had a home of his own now, a job, a family, a life in a country where no one cared that he was a Hazara, where most people didn’t even know what a Hazara was. Maybe not. But maybe so.I can’t go to Kabul,?I had said to Rahim Khan.?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 cost Hassan a chance at those very same things?I wished Rahim Khan hadn’t called me. I wished he had let me live on in my oblivion. But he had called me. And what Rahim Khan revealed to me changed things. Made me see how my entire life, long before the winter of 1975, dating back to when that singing Hazara woman was still nursing me, had been a cycle of lies, betrayals, and secrets.There is a way to be good again,?he’d said.A way to end the cycle.With a little boy. An orphan. Hassan’s son. Somewhere in Kabul.” Chapter 19:p.211 Amir’s car sickness – his guilt has not been redeemed, returning to Afghanistan could symbolise his mental return to Hassan and the past events; could be a metaphor for the country itself being sick. p.212 “broken terrain”, “jagged peaks” (threatening, unwelcome), “old fortresses, adobe-walled and crumbling” – images of abandonment and deficiency “He was dressed much as I was, though I suppose it was the other way around.” – feels like he is wearing a costume, relates to the idea he was always a tourist in his own country p.213 Farid’s story is factual rather than emotive. Lack of sympathy through what he been through. Normalise like it is every day, maybe a critique of news stories or to show how common it is. “or at least the Taliban version of Shari’a.”p.213-215 – there is a change in Amir’s view of forgetting the past, he appears to want to embrace it. But there is also a fear of running away, he is unable yet to fully embrace it. “But I knew I had to leave as soon as possible. I was afraid I’d change my mind. I was afraid I’d deliberate, ruminate, agonize, rationalize, and talk myself into not going. I was afraid the appeal of my life in America would draw me back, that I would wade back into that great, big river and let myself forget, let the things I had learned these last few days sink to the bottom. I was afraid that I’d let the waters carry me away from what I had to do. From Hassan. From the past that had come calling. And from this one last chance at redemption. So I left before there was any possibility of that happening.”Suffering and poverty Taliban have brought. “discarded toys among rocks” – childhood imagery“On either side of the road, I saw chains of little villages sprouting here and there, like discarded toys among the rocks, broken mud houses and huts consisting of little more than four wooden poles and a tattered cloth as a roof. I saw children dressed in rags chasing a soccer ball outside the huts. A few miles later, I spotted a cluster of men sitting on their haunches, like a row of crows, on the carcass of an old burned-out Soviet tank, the wind fluttering the edges of the blankets thrown around them. Behind them, a woman in a brown?burqa?carried a large clay pot on her shoulder, down a rutted path toward a string of mud houses.”p.215-216 “I feel like a tourist in my own country.” – this is a trigger sentence for a conversation between Farid and Amir about his life. From this the reader learns that the picture of Afghanistan they have seen is a privilege view. “I feel like a tourist in my own country,” I said, taking in a goatherd leading a half-dozen emaciated goats along the side of the road.Farid snickered. Tossed his cigarette. “You still think of this place as your country?”“I think a part of me always will,” I said, more defensively than I had intended.“After twenty years of living in America,” he said, swerving the truck to avoid a pothole the size of a beach ball.I nodded. “I grew up in Afghanistan.”Farid snickered again.“Why do you do that?”“Never mind,” he murmured.“No, I want to know. Why do you do that?”In his rearview mirror, I saw something flash in his eyes. “You want to know?” he sneered. “Let me imagine, Agha sahib. You probably lived in a big two- or three-story house with a nice backyard that your gardener filled with flowers and fruit trees. All gated, of course. Your father drove an American car. You had servants, probably Hazaras. Your parents hired workers to decorate the house for the fancy?mehmanis they threw, so their friends would come over to drink and boast about their travels to Europe or America. And I would bet my first son’s eyes that this is the first time you’ve ever worn a?pakol.” He grinned at me, revealing a mouthful of prematurely rotting teeth. “Am I close?”“Why are you saying these things?” I said.“Because you wanted to know,” he spat. He pointed to an old man dressed in ragged clothes trudging down a dirt path, a large burlap pack filled with scrub grass tied to his back. “That’s the real Afghanistan, Agha sahib. That’s the Afghanistan I know. You? You’ve?always?been a tourist here, you just didn’t know it.”There is less pine and palm trees – green represents Koran, and so lack of green may suggest immorality and so ironizes the Taliban; green also represents growth, so lack of trees may symbolise Afghanistan’s decline. “In the old days, the winds swept through the irrigates plains around Jalalabad where farmers grew sugarcane, and impregnated the city’s air with a sweet scent. I closed my eyes and searched for the sweetness. I didn’t find it.” – childhood and past, better views or more glossed view; remembering how life used to be. At first pleasant description of the family – “ocean-green eyes”, “white scarf” of Farid’s wife, Maryam, but “flinched” (p.218) and “peeled” suggests fear p.217 Lack of light inside the house may signify lack of hope. Amir takes his shoes off, this shows respect. Amir receives a hostile view from Afghanistan and Farid. This is contrasted with the meeting of Wahid. This can be linked to cultural traditionsp.217-218 – differences between men and women the woman are quite – do not meet gaze, quiet voice, careful look – may suggest fear as well p.219 Amir does not lie about who Hassan was. May suggest acceptance. Wahid and Farid may be a representative of people who were not able to leave Afghanistan p.220 The watch that Amir gives to the boys while in reality they were hungry may represent the consumeristic and materialistic life of America and not of simple things like food. It may show how privilege is Amir, for he does not have to think about food and able to have accessories like watches. p.222 Amir embracing his Afghan identity. p.223 Amir leaving money under the mattress, similar to the episode with the watch may link to Amir leaving money and the watch under Hassan’s mattress. Here however he does it for the good of the family and so maybe a sign of his maturity. It may show that he is turning more into his father, who did a lot of charity work, at the expense of himself. Though hiding under the mattress may simply done not to make Wahid uncomfortable as Afghans unlikely to take money due to their honour and pride, it may also show that Amir is not yet standing up, as Baba has done. Chapter 20:p.225 “Farid gave me a look that said hearing is not the same as seeing.” There is description of destruction and poverty. p.227 Amir notices that all the trees were gone. They were cut down for firewood and Shorawi cut the down due to snippets hiding in them. Not allowing women to work, yet to lack of men they cannot care for their children or for themselves revealed through the orphanage scene with Zaman. Chapter 21:p.238 “Hardly anyone seemed to notice him.”“a haze of dust covered the city and its sun-dried brick buildings.” – lack of lifep.239 In the Wazir Akbar Khan district the house were in good shape, better streets and “trees still peeked over the walls.”From Farid the reader learns that “the people behind the Taliban. The real brains of this government” live here and they are from other countries, “Arabs, Chechens, Pakistanis”. Farid informs Amir and the reader that is what they are called by Afghans, “guests”. There is juxtaposition in this chapter – childhood memories vs the reality; American values vs traditions/values of Afghanistan p.239-240 Turtle –comforting memories – easy to find, house is easy to find He is separated from the house like Hassan was – forced out by the people who have greater power than him. p.240-241 “more tangle of weed sprouted through the fissures. Most of the poplar trees had been chopped down…the ones still standing were nearly leafless…the law had turned the same brown as the haze of dust hovering over the city, dotted by bald patches of dirt where nothing grew at all…I saw no sign of rosebushes…only dirt…and weeds.” “Like so much else in Kabul, my father’s house was the picture of fallen splendor.”p.242 “I don’t want to forget anymore.” – acceptance, standing up to the reality “each ragged breath felt like inhaling fire” – redemption of his painp.243 “headstones were barely visible through the thick tangle of weeds that had claimed the plot.” Tree no longer bearing fruit symbolises death of their friendship and memory. This is accorder where most things stayed the same, not destroyed – earing echoes of memories, link to old life. But as it near cemetery, there was always foreshowing of death or echo that there is always death. p. 244 Large prices – survival or exploitation? Perhaps American vs Afghanistan?Farid tells of Amir about his life and Amir about his. What Amir talks about are simple things, perhaps understanding that simple things matter or that grander things would not make sense in this world or to Farid. Difference in culture and situation. p.245 Farid’s thoughts are less extreme but similar to the Taliban. p.246 ‘Sexy pictures’ – cultural differences between that definition and punishment for it p.246-7 – the sports stadium is also the place for violence and hanging; sports represents enjoyment but now also linked with violence. “I have never wanted to be away from a place as badly as I did now. ‘But we have to stay.’” – confront extreme feelings, ironic. The hanging has similar/correlations to the Handmaid’s salvaging. Violence, people remain due to fear of leaving or not accepting. Their cheering during the execution could also be linked with that. “cry of wild animal” – dehumanisation of bad situation; Amir is distancing himself from her as he knows she is about to die p.248-9 God’s word – alludes to hypocrisy of all religions, including Christian and Muslim in terms of doing violence or killing for God. The God does not punish but the followers; Baba’s view of God is contrasted here – he also hoped that Muslim fanatics will never take over Kabul, for belief of grief and this has occurred. This Amir remembrance, Hosseini is reminding the reader of Baba’s words, a mythological-associated character in this story. p.249 The Taliban who does the execution, later revealed as Assef, has a celebrity-description. Makes the sport appear to be more like entertainment for the audiences. There is contrast of black and white in his image. “The sign of him drew cheers from a few spectators. This time, no one was struck with a whip for cheering too loudly.” “The spectators’ “Oh” rhymed with each flinging of the stone”“black sunglasses” – hero imagery. They hide his eyes, suggesting either he cannot see reality or others cannot see reality as eyes can represent knowledge and truth about situation or person. “He greeted the crowd by turning slowly in a full circle.” – acts like a celebrity, like he is loved. “white garment glimmered in the afternoon sun”, “the hem of his loose shirt fluttered in the breeze, his arms spread like those of Jesus on the cross.” – both are positive images, in terms of cultural and religious allusions of white to purity, peace and goodness. CleanlinessLove of god. Image of God, representative of God or are they God?Creates a heavenly image that is intensified by liking the Taliban to image of Jesus through a simile. This is juxtaposition to what he is doing and how generally Taliban’s actions are not peaceful or pure.This clothes is later covered in blood, subversion of imagery, butcher. Likened to John Lennon who is a peaceful image. Hosseini here is subverting imagery, to make an impact in writing is to change of undermine common images. This is hypocritical as they are not peaceful. Amir closes his eyes and covers his face at the violence but is unable to leave. The reactions appears to be childlike, however, he does not run away. It could be argued that there is some acceptance there. p.250 “how unofficial even official matters were in Afghanistan.” – juxtaposition, alludes to dictatorship or cultureChapter 22:Redemption and subverting imagery present in this chapter Recurrence is present in this chapter. Sohrab is an image of Hassan: his physicality, what has been done to him (sexual abuse), slingshot, what has he done to Assef – threw a bras ball in his eye and made him blind like Hassan promised he would do. Amir meeting Assef. Assef beating up Amir is related to his promise of punishing both of them. Amir describes this recurrence using “the old saying about the bad penny? My past was like that, always turning up.” p.258p.251-2 “I wished I didn’t have to go in alone. Despite what I had learned about baba, I wished he were standing alongside me now.” – Baba, brave; Amir is not as brave as Baba is. “a prayer rug…was nailed to one of the walls.” – is it used? Hypocritical of the Talibanp.253 Amir and his cowardice. “New Age (new world, change of belief, not old-version of religion) mystic (cool-sounding) guru (philosophy, simple life (that arguably Assef does not lead by state of his house, what he owns and his story of his parents))” “gold watch” – wealthp.254 The execution is referred to by Assef/Taliban as “the show”. “Public injustice is the greatest kind of show, my brother. Drama. Suspense. And, best of all, education en masse.” p.254-5 His “real show” is the massacre of Hazaras in Mazar-i-Sharif. His links his violence to God and makes it much more positive action that it is. “men and boys” killed – cultural“Dog meat for the dogs” – dehumanising the Hazaras. p.256 “footfalls, and the jingle of bells with each step. It reminded me of the monkey man…the bell around his monkey’s neck had made that same jingling sound.” – shows that Sohrab has been treated in a dehumanising way and for entertainment purposes. He also revealed on p.256-257 that he is dressed and wears make-up, stereotypically feminine, and so perhaps done for humiliation as well as dehumanisation because women are treated in Taliban society as second-class/lower than men. “I guessed music wasn’t sinful as long as it played to Taliban ears.” p.260-261 – Assef’s story can be linked to Hitler’s, a person who the readers knows he admired as a child. The person who was kicking him was “a half-Hazara, half Uzbek”. He has some links to Assef – wearing “knee-high boots with steel toes” that could be linked to Assef’s brass knuckles and their likeness of violence and beating up individuals. Assef here can be also linked to Amir as in both cases the reaction to the beating would be eventually laughter. Interestingly, both Assef and Amir at the end of their suffering turned to God and religion, both Muslim religion. “I knew that had been a message from god: he was on my side. he wanted me to live for a reason.” Amir is viewed as a traitor by Assef. “But there are things traitors like you don’t understand…Like pride in you people, your customs, your language. Afghanistan is like a beautiful mansion littered with garbage, and someone has to take out the garbage.” – Assef view of Afghanistan is to leave Pashtuns, male-dominated/ patriarchal society using violence but for him it is about making his country great. Amir has left his country and lacks some Afghan custom and culture. p.262 “slaughter sheep’s eyes. They even had the mascara – I remembered how, on the day of Eid of qorban, the mullah in our backyard used to apply mascara to the eyes of the sheep and feed it a cube of sugar before slicing its throat.” – the same episode Amir is reminded of when looking into Hassan’s eyes during the rape. The story as a child is slightly different: it was Ali who fed the sugar and there was no mention of the mascara. However, “the custom is not let the sheep see the knife” p.72. This may be one of the places where the reader is aware how Amir is an unreliable narrator. p.264 “Assef put down his prayer beads.” – separation of religion and violence; does not want to bloody them with sin/blood“The prayer rug…came loose from the way at one point and landed on my head; the dust from it made me sneeze.” – questions if they are really followers of God; peaceful juxtaposition with fight and violence; may represent that both Assef and Amir have neglected religion; it also an absurd funny image, may be there to break up the tension. p.264-267 – fight between Assef and Amir. Flight is a symbol of redemption because through it and the pain from the brokenness of his body he finally received forgiveness. The amount of pain he endured physically can be argued to equal to the pain he endured mentally from his guilt. It shows the extent of his guilt, which is further increased by the listing of medical terms in the following chapter. The laughing caused juxtaposition over the nature and feeling of a fight. Mythological stories usually ends in fights where the protagonist overcomes their enemy who symbolises their own demons. Therefore, Amir defeated Assef who symbolises bad qualities and demons of Amir. Or Assef could also represent his guilt. Chapter 23:broke narrative, many jumps in time, loss of memory – this all could symbolise Amir’s transformation to a different person. “I keep fading in and out.” (p.271)p.271 “I am wresting the bear (Soviet/war; guilt/Assef)” – he becomes his father (Baba, associated with bravery/ or fighting Afghanistan), he sees himself as brave enough or sees himself more like Baba. The bear is black which can suggest evilness. Baba – “he is the Baba of my childhood, Toophan agha, the towering specimen of Pashtun might…” Amir, especially as a child always admired and seen his father as more of mythological figure, and in this descriptions and actions he appears to represent bravery and strength. Therefore, this suggests that Amir becomes a better person. p.271-273 there is excessive use of medical terms in this chapter, though this novelty can be seen throughout the novel. This makes problems seem distant and specific; sturdy, cannot be changed. Could represent safety and moving back to Western world. It also may show the extent of him being mentally broken. “The impact had cut your upper lip in two…clean down the middle. Clean down the middle. Like a harelip.” Image of Hassan, more like Hassan, symbol of redemptionp.276 “A man who has no conscience, no goodness, does not suffer.” –Rahim Khan may make the reader see Amir as still more positive character, do not blame him. He was a child. Would the reader blame him? Is the character of Amir is realistic? “but the Kabul we lied in those days was a strange world, one in which some things mattered more than the truth.”p.277 Amir jan, I know how hard your father was on you when you were growing up. I saw how you suffered and yearned for his affections, and my heart bled for you. But your father was a man torn between two halves, Amir jan: you and Hassan. He loved you both, but he could not love Hassan the way he longed to, openly, and as a father. So he took it out on you instead – Amir, the socially legitimate half, the half that represented the riches he had inherited and the sin-with-impunity privileges that came with them. When he saw you, he saw himself. And his guilt. You are still angry and I realize it is far too early to expect you to accept this, but maybe someday you will see that when your father was hard on you, he was also being hard on himself. Your father, like you, was a tortured soul, Amir jan.I cannot describe to you the depth and blackness of the sorrow that came over me when I learned of his passing. I loved him because he was my friend, but also because he was a good man, maybe even a great man. And this is what I want you to understand, that good,?real?good, was born out of your father’s remorse. Sometimes, I think everything he did, feeding the poor on the streets, building the orphanage, giving money to friends in need, it was all his way of redeeming himself. And that, I believe, is what true redemption is, Amir jan, when guilt leads to good.I know that in the end, God will forgive. He will forgive your father, me, and you too. I hope you can do the same. Forgive your father if you can. Forgive me if you wish. But, most important, forgive yourself.p.280 “For you a thousand times over.” Farid repeats what Hassan has said. It may represent symbolic forgiveness, the common theme of cycles in the novel and redemption. It also may show the change in Amir as this now represents forgiveness rather than guilt and so transformation or healing, however, by his reaction suggests that he hasn’t finished the process. p.282 Amir’s dream of Assef saying that they are the same, “We’re the same, you and i….You nursed with him, but you’re my twin”. It perhaps shows his unconscious belief that he and Assef has similar actions of hurting Hassan, that he is bad/evil/immoral and not as good as Hassan. It may show that he has not forgiven himself completely, which is why this story continues. Also hints brotherhood. p.284 “I SLEPT THROUGH almost the entire four-hour ride to Islamabad.” Shows that his travel sickness was linked to anxiety. He is able to sleep shows that he is no longer insomniac. So in both cases, shows he is free of guilt. It sounds like a summary of his life, last paragraph. Perhaps shows his change, he went from good to bad to good, cyclic. Finishing with … shows that this story does not have the end yet. “I dreamed a lot, and most of it I only remember as a hodgepodge of images, snippets of visual memory flashing in my head like cards in a Rolodex: Baba marinating lamb for my thirteenth birthday party. Soraya and I making love for the first time, the sun rising in the east, our ears still ringing from the wedding music, her henna-painted hands laced in mine. The time Baba had taken Hassan and me to a strawberry field in Jalalabad – the owner had told us we could eat as much as we wanted to as long as we bought at least four kilos – and how we’d both ended up with bellyaches. How dark, almost black, Hassan’s blood had looked on the snow, dropping from the seat of his pants.?Blood is a powerful thing, bachem. Khala Jamila patting Soraya’s knee and saying,?God knows best, maybe it wasn’t meant to be. Sleeping on the roof of my father’s house. Baba saying that the only sin that mattered was theft.?When you tell a lie, you steal a man’s right to the truth. Rahim Khan on the phone, telling me there was a way to be good again.?A way to be good again…”Chapter 24:p.285 “If Peshawar was the city that reminded me of what Kabul used to be, then Islamabad was the city Kabul could have become someday.” p.299 “The building itself was like a lot of buildings in Islamabad: flat and white.” The descriptions of Islamabad are images of wideness, cleanness, white colour and has presence of trees. This can suggest freedom, purity and safety. Creates a positive atmosphere and contrast to descriptions of Kabul in previous chapter. p.290 Amir laughing as a response to Mr. Fayyaz words – “The thing about you Afghanis is that… well, you people are a little reckless” – can be interpreted by some critics as Amir accepting his Afghan identity.p.292 – perhaps suggests that Hassan’s goodness is what partly caused his downfall/death p.292-293 – Amir comforting Sonrab can be interpreted as evidence for his change. Rather than running away he came to find and comfort the boy. p.295-6 “Did your father love you and my father equally?...I think he loved us equally but differently.”/“Was he ashamed of my father?”/“No,” I said. “I think he was ashamed of himself.”Chapter 25:p.315-316 Claustrophobic imagery – “windowless corridor crammed with people”, trouble breathing, even with outside air (p.318). p.316 – Amir appears to face the reality rather than run away. “I want to tear myself from this place, from this reality, rise up like a cloud and float away, melt into this humid summer night and dissolve somewhere far, over the hills. But I am here, my legs blocks of concrete, my lungs empty of air, my throat burning. There will be no floating away. There will be no other reality tonight.” However, some critics would argue that him turning to religion could be seen as a sign of escape. It also can be interpreted as a positive view of religion that Hosseini is presenting here – benefit for others rather than himself, though still can be seen as part of Amir’s personal gain of redemption. (p.316-17)p.318 – semantic field of decay – “smells of overripe dates and dung”, “zigzagging pattern of the cracks on the cement floor, at the cobwebs on the ceiling where the walls meet, at the dead flies littering the windowsill.” “I dream of things I can’t remember later.” – shows Amir’s change. Dreams are often linked to Amir’s guilt; the lack of remembering dreams could show that he is leaving his past rather than keeping it hidden.p.326 “lifting him from the certainty of turmoil and dropping him in a turmoil of uncertainty.” – paradox; contrast with the use of ‘lifting’ and ‘dropping’, one suggesting positive and other negative action. p.327 – cultural difference between American and Afghan culture in terms of movie and endingsp.329 Not everything is solved – “In the darkness of our room, I lay awake, an insomniac once more. Awake. And alone with demons of my own.”“I stood over him, looking down” – can be interpreted by some that Amir has taken an image of Sohrab’s father, similar to how Amir received a scar similar to a harelip. “Your father was a man torn between two halves, Rahim Khan had said in his letter. I had been the entitled half, the society-approved, legitimate half, the unwitting embodiment of Baba’s guilt. I looked at Hassan, showing those two missing front teeth, sunlight slanting on his face. Baba’s other half. The unentitled, unprivileged half. The half who had inherited what had been pure and noble in Baba. The half that, maybe, in the most secret recesses of his heart, Baba had thought of as his true son.” Lack of pain towards the last sentence, acceptance, loss of jealousy. p.331 – here may be evidence for Amir’s change in facing rather than running away from truth. He told the general the truth. Amir also appeared to personify Sohrab, suggesting perhaps this his act of rebellion and standing up to oppression. Perhaps became what Baba wanted his son to become. “You will never again refer to him as ‘Hazara boy’ in my presence. He has a name and it’s Sohrab.”Impact on Sohrab – “Silence?is pushing the OFF button. Shutting it down. All of it…It was the silence of one who has taken cover in a dark place, curled up all the edges and tucked them under.”p.333 Amir became involved in projects similar to Baba, perhaps becoming more like the man his father wanted.p.340 – repetition of “For you, a thousand times over” said by Amir himself. Perhaps this is his transformation to becoming more like Hassan who can be said to represent purity and goodness, or his acceptance of what happened and his willingness of moving on. “I ran.” – positive image of running. Ending of running suggests perhaps that the story is not over. It can be interpreted as Amir moving to the next stage of his life, leaving the other behind that is not coming back to haunt him. Colour codes:Language, structure or form remarkContextThemePage Meaning of trees: ................
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