Kite Runner & the History of Afghanistan

By 17knovitzky23

  • Hassan was born in 1964, "[J]ust one year after [Amir's] mom died giving birth to [Amir]" (3).

    From the start, Hassan and Amir were friends and without the birth of Amire, Hassan wouldn't have the big brother figure to look up to.Although Amir's mother died, the comfort of eachother is enough to get past that. Each of there lives would be completely different without each other, and not one event from the novel would exist or shape who they end up becoming.

  • In a small shack, " Hassan was born in the winter of 1964" (3).

    Hassan's mother was named Saunabar and like Amir's mom, she was never in Hassan's life. From the start, Hassan was always lower than Amir because he is a Hazara. Hassan's father, Ali, worked for Amir's father, Baba.

  • Sanaubar, "eloped with a band of singers and dancers in 1964, just after she had given birth to Hassan" (221).

    Right after Hassan was born, Sanaubar just left, didn't even wait to hold her baby. Causing Hassan to never have a women figure to look up to, of course Hassan was sad about this when he found out. However, he would have to move on because there was nothing h could do about this. If his mom did stay around for Hassan's childhood many more exciting events would have came around. Yet, she didn't so Hassan missed out on a lot of things that most kids take for granted.

  • After watching the World Cups Games on television Baba, "signed  [Amir]  up  for  soccer  teams  to  stir   the  same  passion  in  [Amir]" (40).

    Amir was pathetic at soccer, even if he tried he wasn't good at it. At the same time, it wasn't what he wanted to do, Amir wanted to write. Amir tried to please his father, however, Baba knew that Amir's passion for soccer lacked greatly.

  • Amir realized he wanted to to be an author when he read Hassan a fake story and, "After [Amir] asked him if he'd liked the story, a giggle [rose] in [his] throat, when Hassan began to clap" (30).

    When Amir and Hassan were little, Hassan wasn't able to read, so Amir would always say the stories out lous for him. When he read Hassan this story he knew right away that writing is what he loved. All throughout Amir's life, he wrote about many different things. Writing was a part of him and who he became, and without this moment he might not have been able to discover his passion.

  • After Amir watched Hassan get violated he admitted to himself, "Iran because I was a coward. I was afraid of Assef and what he would do to me" (140).

    For the rest of Amir's life, he always had a heavy weight resting on his shoulder, he couldn't get rid of the fact that he let Hassan be violated. It completely changed Hassan and Amir's friendship, and also how Amir thought of himself.

  • Amir thought that, "It was living in America that gave him an ulcer" (109).

    Amir thought that moving to America would be a fantastic chane for Baba and him, but after finally moving there he started wondering if that was the right decision. Baba and him knew exactly were they stood in Afghanistan, yet they barely knew anything about America. He wasn't used to all these girls running around laughing and all the noise throughout the streets. America was a big change for both of them and life would never be the same in America as it was in Afghanistan for them.

  • A strange lady came up to Hassan and told him, "You smiled coming out of me, did anyone ever tell you? And I wouldn't even hold you" (210).

    Hassan hasn't seen his mother in 26 years, and all of the sudden she comes back and pours all this emotional information on Hassan. Hassan couldn't take it and had to leave, one could only imagine how devistating it would feel if you had never even met your mother and then she just came back to you one day.

  • Amir found out from Rahim that Hassan named this baby, "Sohrab, after Hassan's favorite hero from the  _Shahnamah_" (184).

    In the winter of 1990 Sanabar delivered Hassan's baby and they named him Sohrab. Sohrab might have been one of the best things that ever happened to Hassan. He now had someone that he could really call family and would stick with him everywhere he went.

  • A few weeks after the war ended in 1996, "the Taliban banned kite fighting. And two years later, in 1998, they massacred the Hazaras in Mazar-­‐i-­‐Sharif" (226).

    Kite flying was a big part of Hassan and Amir's friendship and would always be. Just as Hassan had hope with the war ending, it is once again destroyed by the banning of kite flying and massacre Hazaras. Hassan is now back to worrying, and it seems to just be getting worse.

  • 5 months before Amir visited Rahim the taliban accused Hassan, "of lying when Hassan told them he was living with [Rahim] even though many of the neighbors, including the one who called me,supported Hassan's story" (233).

    Like Hassan, Amir was finally starting to feel hopeful about atoning for what he had done to Hassan when they were kids. And when he finally gets to Rahim's he is also very dissapointed to find out that he was too late.

  • In 2001 Amir gets a call telling him there's a way for him to atone for what he did to Hassan he would go," to rescue Hassan's son Sohrab,orphaned by the brutal Taliban".

    Amir is now hopeful and finally got the call that he has been waiting for his entire life. He ould get to make up for what he did in the winter of 1975, the event that changed his life completely.

  • The one man Amir feared the most was, "  sitting  less  than  ten  feet  from  me,  after   all  these  years.  His  name  escaped  my  lips:  'Assef'"(281).

    When visiting Rahim, Amir finds out that an Sohrab is at an orphanage. However, after traveling a long way to get there he discovers the taliban took him and was now torturing him at that very second. He looks all over for Sohrab and realizes that the taliban member that took Sohrab was Assef.

  • Following his attempt at suicide, "Sohrab was under a twenty-four hours-a-day suicide watch" ( 370 ).

    When Amir finally finds Hassan's son, so many terrible things have happened to him, he was tormented and scarred for the rest of his life by the Taliban. Amir had no choice but to bring him bak to America were he would raise him with his wife. However, because of all the things that took place in Afghanistan, Sohrab wants nothing but to leeave this world all together. Luckily, he didn't and would be able to see that not everyone is cruel and torturous like Assef.

  • After going so long without talking Amir looked down at Sohrab after the kite flying, "[C]orner of his mouth had curled up just so. A smile. Lopsided. Hardly there. But there" (391).

    Amir finally reached out to Sohrab and shared with Sohrab his passion of Kite Flying that he also shared with Hassan. Amir had finally done what he needed to do to make up for what he had done to Hassan.