hero's journey kite runner

The Kite Runner

Introduction of the kite runner.

The Kite Runner is based on the childhood memories of Khaled Hosseini of his homeland, Afghanistan. It was published in 2003 by Riverhead Books, and immediately created ripples on the US shelves. The unusual appearance of the story seems to present the Afghan background, culture, and ethnic tensions in the city of Kabul and the country on a wider scale. Though it also encompasses the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Afghan cultural erosion, and Pakistan’s support of the refugees . The story revolves around the character of Amir and his friend Hassan in the same backdrop.

Summary of The Kite Runner

The storyline starts with Amir recalling 26-year old Afghanistan and picturing himself as a boy, living at a luxurious home with  Baba,  his father. Two servants, the father and the son, Ali, and Hassan from the Hazara community of northern Afghanistan are serving both of them. Even though Hassan was a servant boy, Baba would always let Hassan sit on his lap leaving no room for affection for Amir. Amir always wanted to win Baba’s validation since he was always condemned by him for being feminine because he was more interested in writing. Then he recalls, Rahim Khan, a friend of his Baba, who often visits them who Amir considered as a father figure as he felt more appreciated by him. Meanwhile, Assef the kid from the neighborhood who was half Pashtun himself who has a German mother always picked on Hassan because of his Hazara community.

The story, then, moves to the kiteflying tournament in which the boys participate using different tactics on the kite strings to cut off the kites of the opponents. The boys running after the cut-off kites are the kite runners. When Amir cuts off a kite, Hassan runs to catch it but finds himself trapped in a blind alley when Assef sodomizes him, and Amir pretends as nothing has happened as he feared his father’s anger for showing the act of cowardice. Later, he tries to get Hassan and Ali expelled by Baba by orchestrating the money stealing issue as he puts some money under the pillow of Hassan as he couldn’t live with the guilt. This incident makes them move away from each other.

It happens in 1981, then, when Baba and Amir are leaving Kabul after the USSR invasion. They reach Pakistan from where they leave for Fremont where Baba starts working and educating Amir who attends a college. With the passage of time, they meet other such immigrants among which General Taheri is important whose daughter Soraya also visits them. Both of them start meeting but their elders tell them that they would decide the issue of their marriage which is settled amicably. Although they start wedding preparations, Baba’s health suddenly deteriorates due to terminal cancer. Shortly, after the wedding, Baba dies. Amir and Soraya, then, face another misfortune of not able to bear children.

Time passes by quickly. It happens that Rahim Khan, after getting sick, calls Amir to visit him when he is in Pakistan. He tells him about the situation in Kabul. The departure of the Soviets and arrival of the Taliban has further played havoc with the city and life in general, he tells him adding when they left Kabul, he coaxes Hassan to come with his wife, Farzana live in Baba and Amir’s house and be a caretaker but the Taliban shot him and his wife dead in front of the whole street when he tried to stop them from confiscating the house. They left a baby Sohrab behind. Now Rahim wants Amir to bring Sohrab to Pakistan and who will be taken care of by a couple. He also reveals that Hassan was his half-brother, as he was Baba’s son from a Hazara lady, though Baba handed him over to Ali to bring him up, living close to him, to keep the issue under the carpet. Amir soon leaves for Afghanistan but finds nothing as he runs from pillar to post to find Sohrab after watching a gruesome scene of stoning a woman to death. The next day, he meets an official who takes him to meet Sohrab who appears feminine after having suffered several sexual attacks. Suddenly Amir senses that the official is Assef who starts beating Amir, while Sohrab shoots him with his slingshot in his eye. Meanwhile, they flee from the scene and reach Pakistan where he finds out that after all there was no one to take care of Sohrab.

Finally, Sohrab becomes their adopted son as Soraya and Amir take him in their fold. However, before taking him to the United States, they would have had to prepare papers for him. . When Amir tells Sohrab he’s going to put him briefly in an orphanage, Sohrab tries to commit suicide. When they take him to California after finally becoming successful in getting a visa for him, they visit a park where Sohrab who is his old mate Hassan’s son is now his son. flies a kite and starts a kite-cutting contest where he runs the kite for him saying, ‘For you, thousand times over.

Major Themes in The Kite Runner

• Homeland: Love for one’s homeland is the major theme of the novel as Amir shows that though they live in luxury in Fermont in California, he longs to return to his land, Kabul, where he spent his childhood despite living and enjoying the freedom and open-minded society for having a choice. However, pangs of nostalgia force him to respond to the calls of Rahim from Pakistan and return to get Sohrab back to the United States. Amir later adopts him as a son. He does it wholeheartedly to compensate for the cruelty he demonstrated toward Hassan during his childhood – his own flesh and blood. Both Soraya, his wife, and he become quite happy and satisfied after making Sohrab a part of their family and teach him to fly a kite in California. At that moment, he finds that he feels at home after visiting his homeland.
• Betrayal: The Kite Runner shows the thematic strand of betrayal through the characters of Baba, Amir, and Hassan. Baba betrays his wife from the Hazra community, and then leaves his son Hassan with Ali to fend off themselves. Amir betrays Hassan by leaving him in the cul de sac to fend off himself, though, Hassan has always stood by him through thick and thin. Unfortunately, Hassan dies leaving his son Sohrab to take care of himself. Although it is not a betrayal in that sense, yet Sohrab is left alone in the world.
• Guilt and Redemption: The theme of guilt and its redemption occurs through the character of Baba who has a wife and a child in the city, living with him yet he does not dare own them publicly. However, later, he tries to redeem it by demonstrating his love for Hassan, yet that, too, does not prove fruitful, or of any use to him. It rather causes jealousy to Amir which he later redeems by taking Hassan’s son, Sohrab, out of Kabul to California.
• Familial Relationships: The novel allows the readers to discover twisted familial relations through Baba, Hassan, Amir, and Sohrab. Baba has two sons, but he could only claim Amir and not Hassan who is from the mother , having considered lowly ethnic background. Therefore, Hassan becomes an outcast in the Kabul society despiting the son of an aristocrat, while Amir leaves for California with Baba. Later, when Amir and Soraya do not have their own children, Amir comes to take Sohrab back after the latter loses his father in the war-torn Kabul. These familial relations and their interaction become another theme of the novel.
• Memory and Nostalgia: When Amir remembers Kabul while living in California, America , Baba narrates to him about Kabul and Afghan stories. Baba recollects those memories that keep haunting the old man and his son in the United States. The nostalgia forces Amir later to seek immediate flight to Pakistan, meet Rahim in Peshawar and pick up Sohrab in a daredevil feat. Even the taking of Sohrab to California is an action of effort to forget the nostalgia of leaving Kabul.
• Kite Flying: The game of kite flying shows human effort, growth, aspirations, and love for each other. When Amir loves flying kites, Hassan stands by him in the flying contest and runs after kites for him. However, when it comes to Amir, he abandons Hassan with fear and hurry. Later, he redeems by rescuing Sohrab, Hassan’s son, when he takes him to California adopting him as his son.
• Politics: The novel shows global politics at work due to its references to Communism, jihad , departure of Baba, and Amir to the United States and the free society of California. It tries to portray the United States as a paradise that extends refuge to people like Baba and Amir, from the war-torn Afghanistan, where even generals are roaming around. It also shows the ethnic fissures between the Pashtun, Hazara, and sectarian issues of Shia and Sunni that have led to the devastation of Afghanistan.
• Racial Discrimination: Racial and ethnic discriminations continue to destroy the social fabric of Kabul and Afghanistan. Although Baba is quite liberal and possesses good fortune, he cannot dare to own Hassan as his son from a Hazara lady due to the reprisals from the Pashtuns. He can only extend his love. However, Amir does not fear taking Sohrab who is from Hazara ethnicity and brings him to live in the United States.
• Marginalization of Femininity: The novel shows the marginality of the ethnicity and minority through the character of Hassan and Sanaubar. Hassan represents the ethnicity of Hazara and its significance in the Afghan social structure, while Sanaubar’s role and her story show the marginality of femininity.

 Major Characters in The Kite Runner

• Amir: The main character and protagonist of The Kite Runner , Amir is Baba’s representative of the elite structure of Kabul having all the luxuries and privileges. Despite this, he feels detached from the existing realities and does not show bravery which Baba desires him to show when it comes to human contests. For example, he does not extend protection to Hassan or protects Hassan when others violate his honor, while Baba does not express pleasure over this betrayal. His attempt of insulting Hassan, though, emerges from his jealousy of Baba’s love for Hassan. Later, Amir repents and realizes his flaw, when he comes to meet Rahim in Peshawar to redeem himself from this guilt. Hence, he redeems himself when he takes Sohrab with him to California and plays kite flying with him in a park.
• Hassan: Despite being subservient to Amir, Hassan’s character does not seem subdued by the circumstances. Belonging to a marginal ethnicity rather makes him a favorite character in the novel as he grows up under the shadow of Amir yet makes him seek Hassan’s support where he does not think himself fit to fight others. Even the end of the novel makes him repent over his prejudicial attitude toward Hassan, who is not present, yet his son Sohrab wins love from Amir as his adopted son.
• Baba: Baba is a highly esoteric character in those several aspects of his personality emerge on the scene after his death. Amir comes to learn that Hassan was his son too, and he cannot reconcile with this idea. He wonders why he had never expressed the truth or treated him on equal footing with Amir as a son. However, he senses that his love for Hassan must have a cause behind it that he sees himself. Amir later learns that the old aristocrat from Kabul, perhaps, failed to adapt himself to the urban setup of Kabul where prejudice and malice still existed at that time. However, Baba might have seen that California would dispel these negative emotions from Amir and it proves right when Amir comes back to take Hassan’s son.
• Rahim Khan: Rahim Khan’s character is also an important one. He asks Amir to visit Peshawar as he has some important news for him. He utilizes his old business terms with Baba and when Amir comes to meet him, he tells him the whole story behind Hassan and Baba’s relation and tries to make him understand the significance of Sohrab and his safety.
• Sohrab: Hassan’s son Sohrab becomes significant in the novel in that Amir considers him his own son instead of just the son of his stepbrother, Hassan. Therefore, he does not leave any stone unturned to save him from the clutches of Assef when he visits Afghanistan for this very purpose at the request of Rahim Khan. Later, he provides Soraya and Amir a chance to win happiness.
• Assef: Despite belonging to double ethnicities, Assef becomes a bully as well as a villain of The Kite Runner. His brass knuckles and his bullying makes him the bad character who demonstrates his anti-Hazara sentiments whenever an opportunity arises. He sexually molests Hassan, however, proves dear to him when it comes to Sohrab who is timely saved by Amir. In fact, he shows the unpleasant and dangerous side of life among the good characters of Amir, Soraya, and others.
• Soraya: The significance of Soraya lies in that despite being a daughter of an ex-general, she happily marries Amir and agrees to adopt Sohrab when she knows that she can never bear a child. This kind act of the lady wins the heart of the readers by the end.
• Ali: Despite being a secondary character, Ali has two drawbacks that force Baba to show his humane character. Not only is he limped, but also is a Hazara, and to top all this, he is a Shia. Almost all of these drawbacks make him a target during the melee following the chaos after the USSR invasion. However, he wins the love of Baba which reveals its cause later when Amir comes to take Sohrab to California.
• Sanaubar and Farid: Sanaubar, though, appears for a brief period, is significant. She is Hassan’s mother and belongs to the Hazara community after marrying secretly to Baba, while the significance of Farid lies in his assistance extended to Amir when he comes to take Sohrab.

Writing Style of The Kite Runner

Khaled Hosseini adopted the personal and direct style in his novel, The Kite Runner. The main character, Amir, brings recollections out of his sunken memory presented as long flashbacks , bordering hyperbolic use of personal memories. As Khaled is an ESL speaker , his diction is mostly formal, though, occasionally he has resorted to shaping English to demonstrate the true Afghani cultural nuances in the globalized American value structure. However, the self-translation of one cultural construct might have hampered his abilities. Therefore, the novel mostly seems written in formal language though somewhat broken and choppy dialogs of Assef and other characters living in the vicinity of Kabul shows Khaled Hosseini’s real intention in writing personal memories in the global language. Therefore, this style of writing in formal English suits his requirements.

Analysis of Literary Devices in The Kite Runner  

• Action: The main action of the novel comprises Amir’s migration to California with Baba and then return to Kabul through Peshawar to take Sohrab, Hassan’s son with him. The rising action occurs when Amir sees that Hassan becoming the victim of bullying, yet he does not come to help him. The falling action occurs when Baba and Amir leave Kabul for the United States.
• Anaphora : The Kite Runner shows the use of anaphora . For example, i. I looked up at those twin kites. I thought about Hassan. Thought about Baba. Ali. Kabul. I thought of the life I had lived until the winter of 1975 came along and changed everything. (One) The sentence shows the repetitious use of “I thought.”
• Antagonist : The Kite Runner shows the character of Assef, Russian soldiers, and the Kabul elite as the main antagonists on account of their bad behavior toward Baba, Hassan, and the ethnic Hazra community.
• Allusion : There are a good number of examples of allusions in the novel. i. After I hung up, I went for a walk along Spreckels Lake on the northern edge of Golden Gate Park. (One) ii. … can still see Hassan up on that tree, sunlight flickering through the leaves on his almost perfectly round face, a face like a Chinese doll chiseled from hardwood: his flat, broad nose and slanting, narrow eyes like bamboo leaves, eyes that looked, depending on the light, gold, green, even sapphire. (Two) iii. Gold-stitched tapestries, which Baba had bought in Calcutta, lined the walls; a crystal chandelier hung from the vaulted ceiling. (Two) iv. I remember the day before the orphanage opened, Baba took me to Ghargha Lake, a few miles north of Kabul. (Three) v. He told us one day that Islam considered drinking a terrible sin; those who drank would answer for their sin on the day of Qiyamat, Judgment Day. (Three) vi. We saw Rio Bravo three times, but we saw our favorite Western, The  Magnificent Seven, thirteen times. With each viewing, we cried at the end when the Mexican kids buried Charles Bronson—who, as it turned out, wasn’t Iranian either. (Three) The first two allusions are related to geographical points, while the third and fourth are related to Indian and Afghan landmarks and the last one is related to the theological concept of Islam. However, the last one shows cross -cultural allusions; American, Mexican, and Iranians.
• Conflict : The are two types of conflicts in the novel . The first one is the external conflict that is going on between the local Afghan elite society and the foreign conspirators. Another conflict is in the mind of Amir about his position as a boy, his gentlemanly learning, and his behavior toward Hassan, his half-brother.
• Characters: The Kite Runner presents both static as well as dynamic characters. The young man, Amir, is a dynamic character as he faces a huge transformation during his growth and migration from Afghanistan to the United States. However, the rest of the characters do not see any change in their behavior, as they are static characters like Sanauber, Ali, Rahim Khan, Baba, and even Hassan.
• Climax : The climax takes place when Amir returns to Kabul to take Sohrab, son of Hassan, his half-brother, to the United States.
• Foreshadowing : The novel shows the following examples of foreshadowing . i. I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975. (One) ii. When we were children, Hassan and I used to climb the poplar trees in the driveway of my father’s house and annoy our neighbors by reflecting sunlight into their homes with a shard of mirror. (Two) iii. It was Rahim Khan who first referred to him as what eventually became Baba’s famous nickname, Toophan agha, or “Mr. Hurricane.”. (Three) These quotes from The Kite Runner foreshadow the coming events.
• Hyperbole : Hyperbole or exaggeration occurs in the novel at various places. For example, i. At parties, when all six- foot -five of him thundered into the room, attention shifted to him like sunflowers turning to the sun. (Three) ii. The generation of Afghan children whose ears would know nothing but the sounds of bombs and gunfire was not yet born. (Five) These sentences are hyperboles. The first one shows how Baba’s figure has been exaggerated by comparing him with the sun, while the second shows exaggeration about the Afghan nation.
• Imagery : Imagery is used to make readers perceive things involving their five senses. For example, i. Sitting cross-legged, sunlight and shadows of pomegranate leaves dancing on his face, Hassan absently plucked blades of grass from the ground as I read him stories he couldn’t read for himself. (Three). ii. Something roared like thunder. The earth shook a little and we heard the rat-a-tat-tat of gunfire. “Father!” Hassan cried. We sprung to our feet and raced out of the living room. We found Ali hobbling frantically across the foyer. (Four) iii. The streets glistened with fresh snow and the sky was a blameless blue. Snow blanketed every rooftop and weighed on the branches of the stunted mulberry trees that lined our street. Overnight, snow had nudged its way into every crack and gutter.(Seven) The imagery shows the use of images of sound, color, and nature.
• Metaphor : The Kite Runner shows good use of various metaphors such as, i. My father was a force of nature, a towering Pashtun specimen with a thick beard, a wayward crop of curly brown hair as unruly as the man himself. (Three) ii. Just before sunrise, Baba’s car peeled into the driveway. (Five) iii. Outside the walls of that house, there was a war raging. (Sixteen) The first example shows the father compared to a model, the second sun to a knife, and the third war to a furious person or bull.
• Mood : The novel shows various moods in the beginning; nostalgic, neutral, and indifferent, but it turns out tragic and at times darkly humorous when the tragic tale of Farzana, Hassan, and Sanauber are told, and when Rahim calls Amir to save Sohrab from abuse.
• Motif : Most important motifs of the novel are pomegranate, kite, kite contestants, migration, and seasons.
• Narrator : The novel is narrated from the first-person point of view , Amir.
• Protagonist : Amir is the protagonist of the novel. The novel starts with his entry, reminiscing about Kabul and his life in that city and ends with his memories of the same thing after looking at Sohrab flying his kite.
• Parallelism : The novel shows parallelism in the following examples, In the end, I was a Pashtun and he was a Hazara, I was Sunni and he was Shi’a, and nothing was ever going to change that. Nothing. (Four).
• Rhetorical Questions : The novel shows good use of rhetorical questions at several places such as, i. She had a large purple bruise on her leg for days but what could I do except stand and watch my wife get beaten? If I fought, that dog would have surely put a bullet in me, and gladly! Then what would happen to my Sohrab? (Seventeen) ii. How could I have been so blind? The signs had been there for me to see all along; they came flying back at me now:  (Eighteen) iii. In his rearview mirror, I saw something flash in his eyes. “You want to know?” he sneered. “Let me imagine, Agha sahib. You probably lived in a big two- or three-story house with a nice backyard that your gardener filled with flowers and fruit trees.  (Nineteen) This example shows the use of rhetorical questions posed but different characters not to elicit answers but to stress upon the underlined idea.
• Setting : The setting of the novel spread over three countries; Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the United States.
• Simile : The novel shows good use of various similes. For example, i. So I read him unchallenging things, like the misadventures of the bumbling Mullah Nasruddin and his donkey. (Four) ii. Something roared like thunder. (Five) iii. Flanked by his obeying friends, he walked the neighborhood like a Khan strolling through his land with his eager-to-please entourage. (Six). These are similes as the use of the word “like” shows the comparison between different things.

Related posts:

• The Kite Runner Themes
• The Kite Runner Characters
• The Kite Runner Quotes
• As High As a Kite
• Woman with Kite
• Khaled Hosseini

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The Kite Runner

Khaled hosseini, everything you need for every book you read..

The narrator, Amir , grows up in a luxurious home in Kabul, Afghanistan, with his father Baba . They have two Hazara (an ethnic minority) servants, Ali and his son Hassan , who is Amir’s closest playmate. Amir feels he is a disappointing son to Baba, but he is close to Baba’s friend Rahim Khan . Amir and Hassan fly kites and read stories together, though Hassan does chores while Amir goes to school. One day three boys named Assef , Wali , and Kamal threaten Amir, but Hassan scares them away with his slingshot.

In the winter there is a big kite-fighting tournament where boys try to cut each other’s kites with glass-covered strings, and then “kite runners” chase after the fallen kites. Amir wins the tournament, and then Hassan goes to retrieve the losing kite. When Amir goes after Hassan he finds him in an alley, trapped by Assef, Wali, and Kamal. Amir watches as Kamal and Wali hold Hassan down and Assef rapes him. Amir runs away, and later both he and Hassan pretend nothing has happened.

Amir and Hassan soon drift apart. Amir is tormented by guilt, and he decides to make Hassan leave the house. He hides some money under Hassan’s mattress and tells Baba that he stole it, and Hassan doesn’t deny it. Baba forgives Hassan, but Ali and Hassan leave the household.

In 1981, Baba and Amir flee Kabul, which has been invaded by the Soviets. They eventually make it to Pakistan, and months later move to Fremont, California. Baba works at a gas station and Amir finishes high school and then studies writing at college. Baba and Amir sell things at a flea market, where Amir starts noticing Soraya , the daughter of Baba’s friend General Taheri . After much delaying, Amir starts courting her. Soon afterward Baba is diagnosed with lung cancer. Amir asks Baba if he will ask General Taheri to let him marry Soraya. General Taheri accepts, and Amir and Soraya get married soon after. Baba is pleased with Amir’s marriage, and he dies a month later. Amir gets his first book published and he and Soraya start trying, unsuccessfully, to conceive. Meanwhile, the Soviets are driven out of Afghanistan.

One day Amir gets a call from Rahim Khan, who is dying and asks Amir to come to Pakistan. Once Amir arrives, Rahim Khan tells him about the horrors of the Taliban regime and war-torn Kabul. Rahim Khan says he had been watching Baba’s house for a while, but then found Hassan and convinced him and his wife Farzana to come back to Kabul. Later Farzana had a boy, Sohrab . After Rahim Khan went to Pakistan he learned that Hassan and Farzana were executed by the Taliban, and Sohrab was sent to an orphanage.

Rahim Khan asks Amir to go to Kabul and find Sohrab, saying this is Amir’s chance to “be good again.” He also reveals that Baba was Hassan’s true father. Amir agrees to go, and he finds the orphanage where Sohrab was supposed to be, but learns that a Taliban official took him away a month earlier. Amir (and his companion Farid ) go to a soccer game, where at halftime the official they are looking for executes a man and woman.

Amir meets the official and the man calls in Sohrab, who has clearly been sexually abused. The official then reveals himself as Assef, and he beats Amir with his brass knuckles until Sohrab shoots him in the eye with his slingshot. Amir and Sohrab escape and Amir recovers in Pakistan. Amir then asks Sohrab to come back to the U.S. with him, and Sohrab hesitantly accepts.

Amir discovers it will be almost impossible for him to adopt Sohrab, and he tells him he might have to go back to an orphanage. Soraya figures out how to get Sohrab an American visa, but then Amir finds Sohrab has tried to kill himself. Sohrab survives, but stops speaking altogether. Amir brings Sohrab to California, but he remains silent and withdrawn. One day they are at a park and some Afghans are flying kites. Amir buys one, and he and Sohrab fight another kite and cut it. Sohrab smiles, and Amir goes to run the kite for him.

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The Hero's Journey of Amir in The Kite Runner, a Novel by Khaled Hosseini

“When we quit thinking about ourselves and our own self-preservation, we undergo a truly heroic transformation of consciousness”, said Joseph Campbell. The Kite Runner, written by Khaled Hosseini, is a story of an Afghan boy who has to go through many trials and suffering in order to make up for his sins. The main character Amir has to rescue his nephew, Sohrab, from the Talibs and bring Sohrab to America with him. Amir wants to repay Hassan, who is his half- brother and is Sohrab’s father, for the guilt that he did in the past. The Kite Runner is believed to be a story of a hero’s journey because it has three important components which are departure, initiations, and return.

First, Amir’s journey starts with a departure which includes a call to adventure and threshold guardian. Rahim Khan, the mentor character in the novel, tells Amir that “There is a way to be good again” (Hosseini 2). Rahim Khan knows Amir’s past of not saving Hassan, Amir’s half-brother, when Hassan was rapped. Now, that Amir knows the truth about his relationship with Hassan, Rahim Khan asks him to go to Kabul to bring Hassan’s son back because Hassan and his wife are killed. Amir’s adventure starts at this point. Returning to Kabul, Afghanistan has never been easy for Amir. In addition to the huge difference between past-Kabul and present-Kabul, Amir has to dress up in a traditionally proper way, or the Taliban would know that he comes from America. Amir has to be extremely careful not to show his identity, as he describes “…perhaps the most important item: an artificial beard, black and chest length, Shari’a-friendly – or at least the Taliban version of Shari’a” (Hosseini 230). Hence, Amir unexpectedly starts his journey with shocking news, which would take him to a place that is full of evil people – the Taliban.

In addition, there are two essential initiations to the story which are abduction and dragon battle. Amir initially thinks that all he has to do is go to the orphanage to find Sohrab and leave Kabul. However, when he finds the orphanage, the orphanage director tells him that Hassan has been taken by a Taliban “There is a Talib official,’ […] ‘Usually he’ll take a girl. But not always.”” (Hosseini 255-256). After Amir learned this news, he goes looking for that Talib official and realizes that the person he was looking for is Assef, his childhood enemy. When Amir was young, Hassan always stood up for Amir whenever Assef bullied them. Now Amir has to stand up for himself and his recently discovered nephew. Nonetheless, his coward and his selfishness have never gone far from him. Fear builds up in Amir; he has never had a fight, and he has the urge to hide or run instead of battling his enemy. Despite his weakness, Amir fights with Assef. Furthermore, Amir feels at peace, “My body was broken – just how badly I wouldn’t find out until later – but I felt healed. Healed at last. I laughed” (Hosseini 289). Amir feels that he is repaying his bad doing in the past; he is not a coward Afghan boy 20 years ago anymore. Overall, Sohrab’s abduction and Amir’s fighting his weakness show that The Kite Runner has the initiation parts of a hero’s journey.

The novel clearly shows Amir’s return, including magic flight/pursuit and freedom to live. Right after Sohrab slingshot Assef in the eye, Amir and Sohrab have to leave the place immediately, or the Talibs might shot them down. Then, in a hospital in Peshawar, Pakistan, Amir could not stay there for a long time either. His companion, Farid, tells Amir “I don’t think you’ll be safe here for long,’ Farid said. He lowered his voice. ‘The Taliban have friends here. They will start looking for you”” (Hosseini 304). Obviously, Assef would want revenge and order his men to look for Amir and Sohrab. Also, they have many obstacles about taking Sohrab to the United States, and there is a very hopeless moment that Sohrab tries to kill himself. However, in the end, Sohrab receives a humanitarian visa, so Amir can bring Sohrab to live with him and Soraya. It’s not the life that Sohrab used to have with his parents, but he is safe and sound. Thus, Amir’s flee from Kabul and Peshawar and his successful return with Sohrab indicates that The Kite Runner contains the returning parts of a hero’s journey.

In sum, the description in the above paragraphs reveals that The Kite Runner is actually a hero’s journey. First, Amir’s departure begins with Rahim Khan’s advice and the Taliban as threshold guardian. Then, Sohrab’s abduction and Amir’s battle with himself and Assef denote the initiations of the novel. Finally, the story ends with Amir and Sohrab’s escape from the Taliban and their new lives in America. Accordingly, there are many other important features that show The Kite Runner’s strong resemblance to a hero’s journey; nonetheless, these are the most obvious details.

Hossseini, Khaled. The Kite Runner. New York: Riverhead, 2013. Print.

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Things To Do | ‘Kite Runner’ play comes to San Jose, where it…

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Things To Do | ‘Kite Runner’ play comes to San Jose, where it all started

Khaled Hosseini’s debut novel “The Kite Runner” was a sensation when it came out in 2003. Following one Afghan boy through the overthrow of the monarchy in Afghanistan, the Soviet Invasion, refugee life in Fremont and the rise of the Taliban, the book rose to the top of the bestseller list and was made into a 2007 movie.

Unrelated to the film, aside from the source material, the stage play of “The Kite Runner” has had a similarly circuitous journey.

Adapted by San Jose State University professor Matthew Spangler, the play was first produced at the university with students in 2007 and officially premiered at the late San Jose Repertory Theatre in 2009. Since then the play has been performed all over, including runs on London’s West End in 2016 and 2017 and Broadway in 2022.

Now it returns to the same venue that launched it 15 years ago, the Hammer Theatre, which has been operated by San Jose State since San Jose Rep’s demise in 2014.

The show is currently on tour in the United Kingdom, and the local visit kicks off its U.S. tour. Like the West End and Broadway productions, both tours are directed by Giles Croft, who first staged it in 2013 at Nottingham Playhouse, where he was was artistic director.

The version of “The Kite Runner” now playing is somewhat different from the one last seen in San Jose.

“Times are different, and certain lines that might have resonated in a particular way in 2007 or 2009 don’t resonate the same way today,” Spangler says. “Certain things in Afghan history or politics or culture are different today than they were then. I teach courses at San Jose State in how refugees and asylum seekers are represented through the arts. I don’t identify as an immigrant or in the space of Afghanistan myself, but many of the actors and people who come on board this show do identify in those ways, and the play has changed over time to accommodate what they’ve told me about how particular lines resonate with them or don’t resonate with them.”

It was through teaching that Spangler first connected with the novel and with author Hosseini, who also lives in San Jose.

“I had read ‘Kite Runner’ when it was first published, and I thought it’d be a good book to teach in my immigration class,” Spangler says. “My plays are almost all based on books, and after I taught the book and I saw how much my students loved it, I thought maybe there’s a play here. I reached out to Khaled Hosseini in 2005 and said, what do you think, could I write a play based on ‘Kite Runner’? So he and I met and talked about drafts of the script.”

Tabla player Salar Nader has been a key part of “The Kite Runner” from the beginning. He composed the music for the San Jose Rep production and has been performing in it from San Jose State to Broadway.

Born in Germany to Afghan refugee parents, Nader grew up in Concord, attending Diablo Valley College and San Francisco State. He started studying tabla with Zakir Hussain when he was 7 years old and has been performing professionally from a very young age. In fact, Nader was only 12 or 13 when he first met future author Hosseini, and it was Hosseini who put Nader in touch with Spangler when the play was in the works.

“Khaled’s father was from Herat, Afghanistan, and my father also grew up in Herat,” Nader says. “Fast forward two decades, and we’re all Afghan refugees living in the Bay Area. In 1994 I performed at this private gathering, and little did I know, it ended up being our author’s private engagement party. I had no idea of this. There was no New York Times bestselling author yet. I showed up to a book signing in 2004 at UC Irvine, and I nervously approached him because I knew there was a movie in the works and all that. And he looks at me and is like, ‘Salar?’ I’m like, ‘Yes. How do you know me?’ And he said, ‘I have a VHS tape in my house of my engagement party. You played tabla for like an hour and a half that night, and then you ran off and played basketball with the kids.’”

The story of “The Kite Runner” hits home for Nader as an Afghan American from the Bay Area. He’s reminded of family stories of daily life in Afghanistan and the Russian invasion and of keeping up with the turbulent changes there when he was growing up.

Now that the Taliban has taken over again and has even outlawed music, the story hits home even deeper.

“It’s so important for me to give a voice to the voiceless artists, artisans, musicians, sculptors, poets of Afghanistan right now, because they’re not able to practice what they have studied and what they’ve grown up doing,” Nader says. “Some musicians have had to literally bury their instruments in their backyard. So I’m trying my best to keep this light on as long as I can. I think it is so important to continue shining that light and not allow any governing body to dim the light of Afghanistan and its thousands of years of cultural traditions. I will not be able to just stand by and allow that to be erased.”

Contact Sam Hurwitt at [email protected], and follow him at Twitter.com/shurwitt.

‘THE KITE RUNNER’

By Matthew Spangler, based on the novel by Khaled Hosseini, presented by the Hammer Theatre and EnActe Arts

When: April 3-7

Where: Hammer Theatre, San Jose

Tickets: $65-$125; www.hammertheatre.com

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