Tariq Batto: The Kite Runner

Tariq Batto – The Kite Runner.

The Kite Runner by Khalid Hosseini (San Francisco, Riverhead, 2003) is said to be the first novel written in English by an afghan writer. The story talks about the situation in Afghanistan from the late 1970’s to 1981, during the Soviet Union, the afghan community in Fremont, San Francisco, and finally the events, in Afghanistan during the Taliban regime. The writer describes the tragedy, sufferance in Afghanistan, and ethnic differentiation between the afghan people during the last decades. The character of Hassan reveals the pain and suffering of the Afghanistan citizens.

The Kit Runner is a novel of strained family relationships between a son and Baba, his father, and between two brothers Amir and Hassan (Hassan was illegitimate half brother from his mother Sanabur and Baba). How they deal with guilt, forgiveness, and redemption. Amir is the main character in the story, Hassan was his friend / servant, a Hazaras living together in the same house. Baba was a successful businessman, well known as an anti-communist. On the other hand, Amir was very jealous of Hassan, because Baba admired Hassan more. Rahim Khan, Baba’s business partner he was real friend to Baba and Amir. Kite Running, in which children attempt to cut down each others kite strings. Amir won the local tournaments, Hassan shouted: “for you a thousand time times over … (86), ran for a mile to retrieve the kite. Assef a Pashtun teenager boy with his two friends attempt to take the kite from Hassan, who refused to give them the kite, finally he was assaulted sexually by Assef. Amir searched for Hassan, and hided when he heard Assef’s voice. He witnessed the rape but he was scared to help him. After words, Hassan and Amir kept a distance from each ither for some time. Amir forced Hassan to leave the house by framing him as a thief, and Hassan falsely confesses. After the Russians invades Afghanistan, Amir and Baba escaped to Pakistan, and then to the USA. Later Baba died from lung cancer, Amir married an Afghan girl Soraya, they couldn’t have children. Amir received a call from Rahim Khan, who is dying from an illness, asking him to come to Pakistan, and told him: “come, there is a way to be good again” … (247). He also told Amir that Hassan and his wife were killed by Taliban, and their son Sohrab was put in am orphanage in Kabul. Lastly Rahim Khan told Amir that he called him to Pakistan for going to Kabul to recuperate Sohrab, and put him in a save orphanage in Pakistan. Finally, Amir went to Kabul and brought Sohrab with him to the USA. At the end of the novel, Amire flew the kite again with Sohrab, saying to Sorhab the same phrase Hassan said to Amir in the Past: “for you a thousand times over” … (476).

The Kite Runner illustrates the ethnic discrimination in Afghanistan, between Hazaras and Pashtun. The former are not educated, their children didn’t go to school; as a good example Hassan who was illitrae. While the Latter ,os of them were weel informed either by sending their children to the Mulla, or to schools as Amir when his father sent him to the Mulla, before going to school. Also there is a difference between the social status, for instance, the Hazaras were poor, the Pashtuns people called Hazaras mice-eating, flat-nosed, load carrying donkeys, and Amir heard some kids in his neighborhood those names to Hassan. From Hazaras history, the Hassan people tried to rise against the Pashtuns in the nineteenth century, but the Pashtuns quelled them with extreme violence, many people were killed or driven from their lands, burned their homes, and sold their women. Further more, the Pashtuns were the majority and were Sunni Muslims, where as the Hasara were uneducated, most of their jobs were as servants or farmers serving the Pashtun people.

The Afghan people felt pain and distress during the last decades. In July 1973, a military coup took place to dismiss the King Zahir Shah who was on vacation. It was still a frightening time for the people of Kabul who always heard about the violent public disorders, and shooting in the streets. For six years, Mohammad Daovud Khan was the president and prime minister of Afghanistan. Then on April, 1978, he was violently over thorn by the people’s democratic party of Afghanistan, which was a communist party and held close relationship with the Soviet Union. In this coup Mohammad Daoud Khan was killed with his family, the country was governed by this party, which started to change many political and social laws in Afghanistan, including abolishing religious and traditional customs. These changes incensed many of afghan who believed and adhered to the traditional and religious laws. The Mujahedins (men engaged in war in the side of Islam) challenged the government to ask the help of the Soviet Union which occupied later Afghanistan in 1979. The occupation lasted a decade, during which the Afghan people suffered vigorously from the Russian Army. For example, Baba faced an event during his escaping with Amir from Kabul to Pakistan at the boarders. He lost his temper with a Russian solder when the solder asked a women traveling in the same truck, to take off her shawl. This behavior is not accepted among the Afghan people, and it is a shame and against the Islamic culture. After the withdrawal of Soviet Union troops form Taliban (Islamic mujahedins) converted Afghanistan into extreme Islamic state. They applied the Islamic rules on the people with exaggeration. Their cruel behaviors were against the real Islam. Hassan and his wife were victims of Taliban officials when Hassan refused to quit the house of Baba, where he lived with Rahim Khan. Taliban, being Sunni massacred Shiites including the Hazara people. They enacted laws of which those banning music and dance, restricting women’s rights. The most tragic plays were the frequent execution in Ghazi Stadium Theater. The Taliban used fear and violence to control the people of Afghanistan.

Khalid Hosseini, in this novel wanted to point the suffering of the afghan people during the last thirty years through the character of Hassan, who suffered a lot from his birth day till his murder with his wife in by in the hands of Taliban. If one reads between the lines, he/she can conclude that the novel contains a lot of melancholy moments and one can not ignore the propaganda that was injected between the story, a negative propaganda which sent through a message, to show the rape and violence in Afghanistan, which degrade the Afghan people. This message can propel people into thinking that Afghanistan is a country of wretchedness and filthiness. In my opinion there is a great exaggeration in describing the events in Afghanistan and the discrimination between the Hazaras and Pashtun. The propaganda which was infused in the novel might reveal the pro-American personality of writer to justify the invasion of the US to Afghanistan in September 2002.