Is There More to the Underlying Meaning?

What a way to end a book! As I talked about in my last blog post, the ending brought the story together for me, almost like a complete circle. For this reason I am highly suggestions The Kite Runner as a must read book, not just for AP English students but for anyone. It is honestly one of the best books I have ever read. I think that I was able to appreciate it more because I was able to analyze it as I read, due to all the practice we have done this year in class. But also because this assignment has given me that opportunity to stop every so often and really think about what I read, which brings me to why my title is what it is.

In a way the underlying meaning that I mention can be thought of as the work as a whole. Or, it could be the themes, symbols and motifs that were presented to me through this novel. But If it weren’t for this assignment I truly don’t believe that I would have caught some of the allusions and literary devices that I did and wrote about.

The first thing that really caught my attention when I finished the book was the way that the book was laid out. It wasn’t just laid out in chronological order by Amir’s life, but it was also influenced by the politics and government of Afghanistan during this time period. Now, I wouldn't have necessarily noticed this if it wasn’t for the blogging assignment, but since we had to analyze our books, it enabled me to research the allusions about the Afghanistan government and the people that influenced the country.

The next piece of The Kite Runner that had more of an underlying meaning that caught my attention was the use of race. There was a heavy influence of race and ethnicity that divided both Amir and Hassan. Hosseini used this divide to create tension and the themes that held this book together. His theme of betrayment was created by society not accepting two different races to be compatible with one another. Without this societal acceptance affect, it would be nearly impossible for Hosseini to hold together his claim of betrayment. The only way he would do so is the betrayment of Amir and Hassan’s mothers. But even then, it would not be as powerful because the piece about social acceptance isn’t in play.

My next piece of evidence for there needing to be a deeper understanding of the novel as a whole comes from the American Dream. When Amir and his father leave for America it backs up the theme of betrayment, but what it really is showing is the chase for the American Dream by those who want a better education and lifestyle. Hosseini indirectly through this betrayment of Amir and Hassan shows why people in Afghanistan leave their homeland and chase the dream of becoming an American. This is significant to the book because it becomes significantly more important towards the end of the book when Amir returns to Afghanistan and remembers everything in his past.

The last piece of meaning that needs to be talked about in The Kite Runner is the circle the book went through. In my opinion, if you did not notice how everything in the beginning of the book connected to everything at the end of the book you missed the main idea of the novel. It was so important to notice the kite running that occurred during the beginning of the book with Amir and Hassan, and the kite running at the end of the book with Amir and Sohrab. As I mentioned in my last blog post this is significant because Amir becomes the kite runner and does it with no hesitation because he remember the horrors that Hassan went through as Amir was the bystander. Sohrab reminded Amir of Hassan, this is why Amir acted the way he did around him. He wanted to make up for what he did in the past to Hassan.

Overall I really liked The Kite Runner and would highly recommend it. I appreciate this blog assignment a lot more now after reading the book, because I am able to understand how much it helped me follow the underlying meaning of the novel.

Themes? Life Lessons? Or Both?

My post on February 15th was about the writing style that Hosseini used in his book, The Kite Runner. I ended up missing out on some key in depth analysis of the symbols that were presented in the book. So, there will be a mixture of both symbols and themes in my latest blog post which explains The Kite Runner as a whole. Luckily these two literary devices are connected throughout this book.

It didn’t take long to see the developing ideas of the few themes that presented themselves in The Kite Runner. But what I was waiting for, was that final turn around at the end of the book where everything comes together and the themes are fully exposed. AND I GOT IT! The themes and symbols (I didn’t describe last post) found themselves to be related in the end.

There are such strong meanings in this book and as I will discuss they are all developed through the characters development and their choices throughout the novel. It is important to know that Hosseini is very key on making every decision that a character makes, count for something later in the book. This is where the most important symbols and themes come into play.

I want to begin by talking about the most important symbol in the book, because I left it out of my last post and it relates to one theme in particular. As you can imagine the kite in the book was very symbolic, not only was it used in the title but it was used in the beginning of the book and the end of the book to show the true meaning Amir and Hassan’s relationship. These two mentions of the kite, show the circle of life in a way. When Hosseini first mentions the kite it happens to be in a more negative scenario, this being the scenario I discussed in one of my early blog posts, where Hassan is raped. He was following Hassan who was his kite runner and he watched him as he was sexually assaulted by a group of kids. The problem ended up being that he was in fact a bystander. But in the end of the book, Hosseini uses the kite to bring a more justified and sound ending to the novel as Amir states, “Do you want me to run that kite for you?... For you, a thousand times over.” (pg 323). The saying “For you, a thousand times over.” was a thought that Amir had in his head and it was an immediate thought. In my mind, Hosseini did this because the symbolism that was represented with the kite the first time was negative, and now that it is in a better situation and he is kite running for Hassan’s son, Sohrab, there is a positive spin on what once terribly depicted and now he is atoning for his sins.

I relate this to my theme because in between the kite symbolism was a lot of betrayment, which was one of the major themes in The Kite Runner. Betrayment is a huge part of the character relationship between Amir and Hassan. When Hassan was younger his mom left him, but this was only his first case of abandonment. As Amir and Hassan's relationship developed throughout the book, it was easy to see that it was headed in the wrong direction which ultimately led to Amir leaving Hassan and moving to America. This gradual decline in their relationship was shown as Amir’s father continuously put thoughts and ideas in Amir's’ mind that changed who Amir really was and it showed in his friendship with Hassan. This becomes a different theme of father and son relationship which I will discuss later. For me, betrayment is a subcategory of what the true theme in this specific part of the book. Amir never claimed that he was running away because of what his dad said, he was running away because of his past. Not being near Hassan and Afghanistan would enable Amir to forget about what happened and start fresh. But what we have learned from most of our AP reading this year, you can't outrun your past it will always be with you but what you can do is change the way it affects you. We can see that this specific theme of letting the past affect you is similar to the ways of people in society today, as it is easier to run away from problems rather than confronting them.

The other theme that I touched on earlier was that of a father and son relationship, but what is most important about it is the love piece and the hatred piece. Amir throughout the whole book has great affection for his dad whom he looks up to and is clearly his biggest role model. But I can’t say the feeling is mutual, it seems to me that there is a slight disappointment in Baba’s eyes. Baba wants has high expectations and is a very classy gentlemen who is well respected, but it is hard for him to see how tough he is on his son. He tries to control who Amir becomes because he wants him to grow up and become successful. Baba is not good at showing his affection for Amir, he simply shows it through his actions towards other things which Baba hopes Amir will see and be proud of.

When people read this book there are a lot of things that are able to be taken away from it. The most important thing follows the lead of running away from your past. After reading this book, the themes told me that I must confront situations head on whenever something occurs because you never know if you’ll have the opportunity again. For instance when Amir left for America but then returned to Afghanistan and found our Hasan had died, He was unable to express his feelings because he had waited to long to do so. These takeaways are more than relatable to my life and I’m sure others as well. Not only did I enjoy the book, but the lessons that I learned from the book are some I will hold on to forever.

The Interesting Writing Tactics of Khaled Hosseini

As I discussed last post, there are many factors taken in for a book to be considered AP worthy. One of the topics on that list is the level of difficulty that the author portrays through his/her writing style. Whether it is telling a story through literary devices, sentence structure or even the chronologic order, Khaled Hosseini does it all. Now, I didn’t go into great depth about it then, but in this post I will be talking about why Khaled Hosseini has chosen to right in the style that he does in The Kite Runner.

With a small portion of my book left, I feel that I have gotten a pretty good grasp on the writing style in the novel. The Kite Runner consists of a lot of symbolism, as the book has a heavy religious and cultural affiliation to it. With this in mind Hosseini uses both the cultural and religious aspect of his novel to build up his characters for the good and the bad. Because the book begins in Afghanistan, then transfers to the United States of America, and then back to Pakistan and Afghanistan, the culture plays a huge role in the symbolism in this book. For example, this is where Amir grew up, the Afghanistan culture will always be a part of him and the way he mistreats others such as Hassan before he leaves for the states could be because of the way he was raised within his culture. We see Hosseini's writing slowly move us in a direction to understand more about Amir's culture, his change in opinion towards Hassan is more of a negative stereotypical view. The beauty of this book is that it is consistently realistic. I have never been to Afghanistan or Pakistan but everything in this story is realistic to an event that happened to Amir.  

Hosseini is constantly using allusions and motifs throughout the novel to display his interesting writing style. As I mentioned before, this book is very realistic and is based on true events that have occurred in these countries cultures. With that in mind, it is important for Hosseini to provide the reader the right amount of allusions. For example, in the beginning of the book Hosseini sets out to set up the book by showing his knowledge of politics with allusions through the characters, “That’s Henry Kissinger” (pg 18). This man was a former security advisor for America, which foreshadows the move that Amir and Baba make to America later in the novel. Another allusion Hosseini uses is in reference to other authors, “Your khala’s medical charts are like the work of Rumi: they come in volumes.” (pg 155). Remi is another writer that is related to America and is referenced because Amir’s dad is inspired by some of his work as a poet.

Motifs are very closely related to theme in this book. You can tell that the work as a whole is related to betrayment, as Amir and Hassan have a relationship that ends up becoming disconnected and one could look at it as Amir abandoning Hassan. But this is a controversial topic as some might believe that Amir left to flee his problems or he left because of what I assume was the state of his country and need for better education. But this is the main motif and in the novel Hosseini does a good job bringing the reader back to realize why the characters are in the positions they are.

The structure of the book whether it be sentence structure or chapter structure is basically laid out in a similar way to each other. For instance, Hosseini spends the first chapter setting up where Amir is now which already gives the reader insight on his views of his childhood and what he gained from it. The very first line of the book is, “I became what I am today at the age of twelve…” (pg 1). This is an immediate flashback to the past and how Amir views it. This shows the chronologic order that Hosseini rights in. With his chapters and sentence structure being the same he likes to go back and forth from the present to the past, constantly showing the reader the effects the past had on the present. This is why flashbacks are so important in this book.     

My last piece of analysis on Hosseini’s writing style is his shift in point of view. Throughout the whole book until chapter 16, Amir was the narrator talking in first person. But in chapter 16 there was a sudden shift, where at the end of 15 Amir was talking about Rahim Khan and stated, “Then Rahim Khan sipped some more tea. Rested his head against the wall and spoke.” (pg 177). But then at the beginning of 16 Rahim Khan was narrator and said, “There were a lot of reason why I went to Hazarajat to find Hassan in 1986.” (pg 178). I believe this shift occurred to make a more personal connection with reader due to the fact that the story Rahim Khan was telling was important to the development of the novel. These shifts in point of view come back to the original narrator who is Amir after chapter 16.

It has been interesting to say the least, analyzing the writing style of Khaled Hosseini. This post has actually helped me understand the structure behind the novel better and has given me a greater understanding of the work as a whole. Which I will discuss next post, as I will wrap up my reading of The Kite Runner and have themes and more motifs ready to go.

Why Khaled Hosseini's Novel is AP Worthy

I presume for most of you It was easy to see the positive view coming out of my last blog post. Before the comments started flowing in and questions began to form, I found myself wondering if I had read enough of the book to properly analyze the characters that had been brought up. The answer is no. Negative actions and betrayal filled my second portion of reading, and proved my themes and ideas wrong. My positive views turned into wrong views as I began to read beyond, for my second blog post. Each page tearing apart what I thought was a great friendship, but I’m glad I kept reading!

Moving on, I believe that I have read enough to answer the question, Is Khaled Hosseini’s novel AP worthy? Hosseini has used two characters to develop his story very similarly to the way that Toni Morrison did with Guitar and Milkman. The foil in The Kite Runner is between characters Amir and Hassan, both of whom have completely opposite lifestyles and are treated differently. Since these foils are developed in The Kite Runner along with other books we’ve read, it allow me to believe that this book is of AP merit.

Foils alone can not be the single reason for a book to become part of an AP curriculum, there has to be more context involved with, and with The Kite Runner, this is the case. Hosseini is able to make the reader think and realize if the part they are reading is significant or, not such as, “I watched Hassan get raped.” (75), this is significant because as the reader this is the first time after Hassan is assaulted, you know for sure what actually occurred. Once you tie it back to the incident that happened a chapter prior, you now must begin to depict the reasoning for placing these phrases where they are. In this case, Hosseini wants the reader to know the direction the relationship between Amir and Hassan is headed. It went downhill fast. “I could step up into that alley, stand up for Hassan-the way he’d stood up for me all those times in the past-and accept whatever would happen to me. Or I could run. In the end, I ran.” (68). The downfall begins here with a choice that Amir will never get back, his decision to leave Hassan by himself and get tortured is where the relationship falls apart. There are parts of the book before this, where I got the sense that Amir’s thoughts were already headed in a direction where all the stereotypical racists and anti religion minds were. I noticed this first at the end of chapter 4 where Amir in his mind says, “What does he know, that illiterate Hazar? He’ll never be anything but a cook. How dare he criticize you.” (30). I believe that this is the true personality of Amir, and he is learning it from his father whom Amir is trying to impress and believes that Hassan must be in his way. These ideas and relationships that must be interpreted in order to make sense of the direction of the book, is why I believe this book consists of AP merit context.

Novels that contain enough complexity and characters that seem realistic to the reader is what really brings out the idea that a book is of AP merit. As far as helping me on the AP exam, I am now able to have another book in my arsenal to choose from while answering free response questions. The Kite Runner is a perfect book to use while responding to a question like we received on our midterm. The question talked about the past and I can relate The Kite Runner to this prompt because I am able to see a trend in Amir’s actions as he is affected by his past and knows that he needs to change the way he is reacting to it. Amir knows he needs to try and forget, as he mentions in chapter 11, “Someplace with no ghosts, no memories and no sins.” (119). This develops the theme of past affecting the present as Amir has moved to America and is now trying to restart fresh.

If I am being honest, I don't believe that this book should become part of the AP curriculum, because it’s a frequently banned book due to its language and and context, but also because I don’t believe that it holds the same depth of analysis that the other books we’ve read do hold. This is the only argument that I would be able to make against it being an AP level book. Also, it is hard to tell if it does or doesn't have as much depth, because a lot of in-depth analysis is found after reading books more than once, and Mrs. LaClair has done that with all the book we’ve studied. Therefore allowing there to be a lot to talk about and discuss.     

Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner in my eyes has the potential to be an AP style book with AP merit. This book includes foils, important character development, relationship development and complexity within the novel, which enables the reader to use context clues and in depth analysis skills in order to figure out the meaning behind the author's text. In my opinion this book should not be brought into the AP curriculum, although I do believe it is of AP merit and must be analyzed closely, it also doesn't quite have enough analysis for an AP class.

An early flash-back to why Amir--also the narrator--has become the person he is today, sets the tone for the life of a young boy living in Kabul. The first chapter consists of quick points and dramatic imagery that left me with questions of how this all came to be? Immediately, there is an important reference by Amir to the kites he sees in the sky, “Then I glanced up and saw a pair of kites, red with long blue tails, soaring in the sky.” This quick reference to what Amir will become, is an early way for the author, Khaled Hosseini, to show character development and bring in the insight that allows the reader to compare this introduction and character to the reading as a whole.

A transition back to the past is made as we are taught about the childhood of Amir and his friend, Hassan. I was easily able to identify Amir and Hassan as the main characters as their childhood friendship seems to be one that we all can learn from. I don’t know how many people can say their best friends first word was their name. Everything they did was shared together since birth. Their friendship was destined to be at a young age, but was also forced upon them, “Hassan and I fed from the same breast. We took our first steps on the same lawn in the same yard. And, under the same roof, we spoke our first words.” Growing up in a troubling time, Amir and Hassan are able to find peace in playing in the outdoors and breaking the rules every once in awhile. Playing around with slingshots, and blinding their neighbors with the blazing sun and reflectors during the middle of the day seems entertaining to say the least.

Amir and Hassan are two characters that instantly bring the reader in and you’re hooked. It isn’t just their likability, but it’s the way they connect that's inspiring and the progression of both Amir and Hassan’s characters in such a short period of time. But what really was intriguing to me was the affect that both Amir and Hassan’s mothers had on them. There are a lot of questions to be raised about their mom’s as Amir lost his after she gave birth to him, and Hassan lost his a week after because she left the family to follow a passion and never came back. But it is safe to assume that their lost mom’s will drive them to become very prominent young men in their society. But with that in mind, the way that Hassan’s mother left seems to still affect him emotionally, but these emotions are triggered by certain events. Specifically as Amir and Hassan are headed to a movie a soldier yells to Hassan “You! The Hazara! Look at me when I am talking to you!” But as Hassan was able to keep his composure the soldier said and did something that made his emotions flow. The soldier made a sexual motion with his hands and said “I know your mother.” Followed by using the worst and most insulting word to describe a women. Soon after, Hassan was crying and Amir was comforting him. Amir has shown to be a caring and warm hearted person who takes care of Hassan. I only reference this specific part of the reading because I believe that the non-existent relationships between mother and son in this book will become a very common theme and relate to a lot that occurs in a bigger scheme of things. Not only does this show how tough it is to have a relationship absent from one's life, but it shows the bond within the friendship of Amir and Hassan. This character development between these two main characters will only gain momentum as the novel continues to add the real ideas and adversity that is still yet to come for me as the reader.

Although Amir is not able to know what his mother was like, he has a very prestigious father who looks after him. Amir has grown up in a very wealthy house and family that has allowed him to experience the better things about the tough times that are occurring. Hassan on the other hand comes from a different story, as he is slightly impoverished and at the same time is classified as a Hazara. This is a minority group that is hated against and is not well respected. This is significant due to the fact that it shows how their lives are so different, yet that's what brings them closer together and makes the characters in this book so powerful. In just the first quarter of the book the character development within Amir and Hassan’s relationship has grown and they will continue to develop through the story as well.

In the early stages of the book it is easy to see many themes start to unroll. Obviously there are the themes of relationship which will be between Baba and Amir (Father and Son), and Amir and Hassan. The other themes that start to develop through the characters, are the relationship they had with their mothers, and it’s not as focused on the actual relationship, because they’re both gone, but the abandonment aspect of it. So far the character development has been fast and has grown significantly between the two main characters. But it doesn't seem like their bond and trust in each other will ever stop or fade away.