Richard P. Wasowski - Cliffsnotes on Hosseinis the Kite Runner

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The Kite Runner follows the maturation of Amir, a male from Afghanistan who needs to find his way in the world as he realizes that his own belief system is not that of his dominant culture. As an adult, Amir also needs a way to atone for a childhood indiscretion, when an act of cowardice costs him more than just a friendship. Set in Afghanistan and the United States, The Kite Runner is a bildungsroman that illustrates the similarities as well as the differences between the two countries and the two vastly different cultures. It is the story of both fathers and sons and friends and brothers, and it is a novel about right and wrong and the nature of evil. Published in 2003 to great critical and popular acclaim, The Kite Runner is considered a contemporary classic.

WRITTEN BY: Khaled Hosseini

FIRST PUBLISHED: June 2003 by Riverhead Books (hardcover edition). First trade paperback edition: May 2004. First Riverhead Essential Edition: September 2005. The Library of Congress has cataloged the novel with the following fiction categories: Kbol (Afghanistan); male friendship; social classes; Afghanistan; betrayal.

TYPE OF WORK: novel

GENRES:bildungsroman; historical novel

SETTING: Opens in San Francisco, and then flashes back to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

MAIN CHARACTERS: Amir; Baba; Hassan; Ali; Sohrab; Rahim Khan

MAJOR THEMATIC TOPICS: alienation; betrayal; class issues (both cultural and socioeconomic); the emotional intensity of childhood affections; fear serving as a motivator; forgiveness; friendship; the inherent nature of human evil; jealousy; lost innocence; love; manipulation; redemption; the role of religion; revenge

MOTIFS: death; desires; doubling; dreams; education; fears; passion; resentment; revenge; violence

MAJOR SYMBOLS: kites, kite fighting, kite running; myths; pomegranate tree; scar; slingshot

The three most important aspects of The Kite Runner:

• This is an historical novel about the pre-Russian invasion and pre-Taliban rule of Afghanistan, as well life in Afghanistan under Taliban rule and life in a post-Taliban Afghanistan. Although the story is fictitious, the information about the political, social, and cultural systems of this Middle Eastern country provides a contrast to the contemporary headlines about Afghanistan primarily being home to terrorist cells. The Kite Runner paints a realistic portrait of a country about which most readers probably know very little and enables readers to separate the people of a country from its leaders (the Taliban) and/or groups (terrorists) associated with it.
• The Kite Runner is a coming-of-age novel about finding ones place in a world of turmoil and transition. It explores the difficulties of developing into an adult relationship with your parents while simultaneously exploring ideas about the human capacity for good and evil, and the relationship between sin, forgiveness, and atonement. Its setting in both Afghanistan and the United States illustrates the universality of its characters and themes. In addition to these topics, The Kite Runner also touches on social awareness, religion, and philosophy.
• The combination of Hosseinis narrative technique (the combining of flashback and flashforward in a somewhat linear timeline), his character development (having even his best characters demonstrate flaws and shortcomings), stylistic devices (including the insertion of Afghani words, his sentence patterns and sentence structure, the use of rhetorical figures, as well as his subtle use of foreshadowing), and his extensive incorporation of symbolism resulted in both critical accolades and popular success of The Kite Runner, a novel that is simultaneously embraced by academia and the general reading populace.

• Khaled Hosseini is born in Kabul in 1965 and is the oldest of five children. His father is a diplomat for the Afghan Foreign Ministry, and his mother is a high school teacher.
• Hosseini has a childhood friend who is a Shia Muslim, and Hosseini grow up in a comfortable existence, loving American movies and flying kites.
• In grade school, Hosseini begins writing short stories.
• Hosseini and his family are living in Paris when the Russian invasion of Afghanistan takes place in 1980, so instead of returning to Kabul, they are granted political asylum and move to San Jose.
• The immigrant experience in The Kite Runner is autobiographical, based on the difficulties that Hosseini and his parents experience in California.
• In 1984, Hosseini graduates from high school, having become fluent in English by this time. Putting his personal aspirations of becoming a writer on hold, Hosseini decides to pursue medicine. In 1989, he graduates from Santa Clara University with a bachelors degree in biology and graduates from UC San Diego School of Medicine in 1993.
• He has a three-year residency in internal medicine at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and then works as an internist for three years in Los Angeles.
• Hosseini returns to northern California in 1999, where he joins a branch of the Kaiser Permanente Medical Group. At this time, he also returns to writing short stories, some of which are published in various literary magazines.