The Kite Runner Final

The Book, The Kite Runner, By Khaled Hosseini, is a historical fiction novel that is a biography of Amir. The Book follows Amir from a young age to his thirties. It also shows his relationships with other characters as he moves from place to place avoiding the Russian soldiers. Amir finally escapes to America and is called back to Afganistan to rescue Hassan’s only son. It tells about Amir`s struggle to be accepted by his father and to understand why people treat people the way they do and be racist.

One of the the purposes of the book is to show how racism affected Afghanistan in his time. I think the racism can be shown by a couple of things in The Kite Runner. The first being racism towards the Hazaras by the Pashtuns as a group and the second being Amir’s relationship with Hassan.

Amir, has a servant that is a Hazara while Amir is a Pashtun. In their culture, Hazaras are lower in the class system than Pashtuns and they are treated much different than them. In this quote, Assef, the neighborhood bully, is putting down Hassan because he is a Hazara.

    “Afghanistan is the land of the Pashtuns... We are the true Afghans, the pure Afghans,... His people pollute our homeland... They dirty our blood.”

   This quote shows the hatred and oppression that the Hazaras go through because they are seen to be the “inferior race”. Even Hassan`s play mate, Amir, doesn’t consider him a friend because the culture tells him that he isn't worth his time. I think this connects to American society, because African Americans were discriminated against for the same unreasonable reasons the Harzaras were: Just small differences in features. I think the author wanted to show that racism not only happens in America,it happens everywhere and sometimes it is even more brutal. I think the author realized how heinous the racism was and now, as an adult, he wanted to reflect on that and share his thoughts and feelings at the time.

Amir’s relationship with Hassan is very interesting because Amir treats Hassan differently in different situations. For example, during the rape, he is cowardly and he doesnt stand up for Hassan and he doesn't even associate with him after it. When Amir is an adult, he treats Hassan like they were best friends (in a sense, they were when they were kids. Amir had too much pride to admit it). I think Amir feels bad that he treated Hassan so badly as a child and even made it so he had to leave there, so he tries really hard to redeem himself. Amir feels that he has to feel the pain Hassan felt to fully feel forgiven for his crime against Hassan. Amir is so driven to feel like he has paid his debt to Hassan, that he travels to Afghanistan to save his son from a group of Taliban. The true redemption happens when Amir gets beat up almost to the death by Assef, the same person who raped Hassan. The author shows irony when Hassan’s son, Sohrab saves Amir from his close to death battle with Assef.  This is ironic because Amir is saved once again by Sohrab, which in my opinion is like a shy continuation of Hassan. I think the author is trying to say that when ever Amir is in trouble some form of Hassan will save him in a verbal conflict or even a physical conflict.

I think the authors other purpose of writing this book is to show Amir’s growth as a character. Amir shows a lot of growth throughout the book in different ways. I think the main growth he makes is that he becomes a lot more selfless. I think Amir also feels guilt because of what he let happen to Hassan.

“Made me see him my entire life, long before the winter of 1875, 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 (Rahim Khan) said .

A way to end the cycle.

With a Little boy, an orphan. Hassan’s son. Somewhere in Kabul”

    This quote shows that Amir still feels guilty for what he and his father did for Hassan’s family and is willing to be put in grave danger to feel relived from the guilt. The main reason Amir traveled to Kabul is that he wanted a weight lifted off his shoulders. He even achieves it after a very hard journey.

    ”...for the the first time since the winter of 1975, I felt at peace. I laughed because I saw that, in some hidden nook in the corner of my mind, I’d even been looking forward to this moment. I remembered the day on the hill I had pelted Hassan with pomegranates and tried to provoke him.”

   Amir had this realization as he almost got murdered by Assef. He finally felt at ease because he felt the pain that Hassan had felt. After this realization, Amir ceases to feel the emotional pain of what happened to Hassan. He also stops feeling the physical pain inflicted on him by Assef, this relief from pain stopped when he wakes up groggy at the hospital.

    Amir’s growth throughout the book is somewhat fueled by Baba’s death. Amir seems to gain a lot more self confidence and determination. This is shown when he courageously travels to Afghanistan, the place that he narrowly escaped, to save his nephew that he doesn't even know. Amir felt that he needed to step up and fill the large hole that Baba left when he died. Amir needed to protect the offspring of Hassan so he valiantly went to save him, after a couple of doubtful thoughts. I think that the old Amir would not have been able to take the initiative to do anything for anyone other than himself, let alone someone he had never met.