Hosseini chooses the phrase “rubble and beggars” sum up Kabul as this is what the city has been reduced to. It gives a perfect snapshot of what has happened to the buildings and the people. Everywhere has become derelict or has been bombed or is no longer looked after and so is a shell of its former self. The people have nothing to live off of – there are very few jobs, very little food and there homes have become simple shelters. They are reduced to poverty under the Taliban’s regime.

Jadeh Maywand was Amir’s home that Rahim Khan was asked to care-take for Baba. It is described a “giant sandcastle” as the building is no longer kept. There are no longer decorations in the garden and so it is a simple sandy colour, the comparison to a sandcastle also references its delicate state – it could collapse at any moment as there is no longer anyone living in it.

The simile about returning to Kabul is effective as he describes it as bumping into an old friend you no longer recognise. Clearly there are things he recognises about the city, like his home, certain streets and the cemetery where he used to play as a child. But the changes in the mood from a vibrant and lively place to a dead town make it feel unfamiliar to him.

The Taliban are made to sound threatening on several counts. They drive a red pickup truck. The colour red is associated with danger and so we are subconsciously made wary of them. They seem young compared to the other men begging in the streets, and they travel in a pack. Their youth and large grouping makes them intimidating. They also have large guns and a lot of them which shows us they are not to be messed with.

The conversation with the beggar in this chapter proves to us how far Afghanistan has fallen as a country. The beggar, a poor destitute man, was once a great professor of learning, he educated the masses and would have held a stable job and lived in a nice home. Now under the Taliban regime he lives in the streets and has no income. This is because the Taliban have no place for people who can think for themselves and would teach others to do the same.
The orphanage is in a horrific state. There is no longer government or local funding to help look after the children. The children have no formal education as there are no longer proper schools. The manager has elected to stay behind with the children despite having a family of his own to look after. The children live in poor conditions with little food or shelter and no toys. The Taliban provide sporadic aid for the children.

It turns out that Farid, the orphanage director, is in the difficult position of letting the Taliban select children to take with them when they visit the orphanage. It becomes very clear that the children the men remove probably end up sexually abused. Farid states that the children who are left behind are at least now provided with food and clothing. He lays the blame and judgement at Allah’s door, knowing that if he didn’t let the Taliban men take these few children in return for money and food then the Taliban would just take the children anyway.

Amir’s Kabul that we see in 1975 is a vibrant and cheerful one. The streets are bustling and street vendors and shops spill across the roads. There are cars and horses and people milling around everywhere. Amir’s home is in a wealthier part of Kabul where the houses are surrounded by gated and walled gardens. Each one seems to be its own mini palace. There is a sense of luxury and safety here.

The Kabul we see here seems to have a bright culture. There are traditional kite tournaments held annually where the young and adults pull together to put on a massive festival. At the Eid festival the streets are again packed with people celebrating and sharing. There is music and art. The education system allows females and males to go to university. Western culture infiltrates the country, with John Wayne country films playing in the cinemas. The politics, although not without corruption, appears to be stable and democratic. The social system still seems to follow an archaic model. There are clear demarcations between the status of various ethnic groups. The Pashtuns are clearly at the top of the rankings, with Amir and Assef coming from wealthy backgrounds. Ali and Hassan, who are Hazara are servants. They get picked on by other people and are seen as having a low status in the world because of their ethnicity.

The Afghan community in America still retains much of the social stratification we saw in 70’s Kabul. When in typical American society the Afghan community mostly mirrors the behaviours of their new country. When in Afghan society they revert back to old customs. For example, at the Afghan market Amir and Soraya cannot be alone together and is frowned upon when Amir approaches Soraya himself instead of sending his father. We see a traditional Afghan wedding when Amir and Soraya get married and the greetings between the General and Baba follow traditional Afghan protocol.

When Amir goes back to Afghanistan it is very much a country torn apart by several decades of war and civil unrest. The buildings are close to crumbling down, the markets have all closed down and the streets are deserted apart from the orphans, beggars and stray dogs.

The Afghanistan Amir returns to is under the dictatorship of the Taliban. They have imposed a strict regime over the nation, which uses their interpretation of Islam to impose strict rules on the people. The Taliban uses fear to ensure that the people do as they say. Many of the arts have been banned and traditions such as kite flying have been stopped. The social system has become worse, women have little freedom, men who refuse to join the Taliban are executed and ethnic groups living in the cities are wiped out (this is how Hassan is killed).

For this book to work in another setting or time, the writer would have to pick somewhere that had both racial and religious tensions going on and where another state or country was seen as a ‘Holy Grail’ land. For example, this story might have also worked in Northern Ireland in the 80’s where a long history of British rule and tensions between Protestants and Catholics caused a great deal of unrest.

In Chapter 18 Hosseini describes how every mention of Hassan caused Amir to feel ‘like the scab was being removed’ on a fresh wound. This is very effective in demonstrating Amir’s emotions at this point. Hassan’s death is likened to a wound inflicted on Amir’s body. It hurts him that his friend is dead. Every time someone mentions Hassan it causes this ‘wound’ to hurt again.
There are a number of things that Amir sees as unmistakeable signs of Baba’s relation to Hassan. First of all Baba paid for Hassan’s lip surgery so his cleft pallet wasn’t as obvious. He bought him an expensive kite for his birthday. He always gave Amir and Hassan money to go to the cinema. He forgives Hassan for ‘stealing’ Amir’s watch. He completely over reacts when Ali says he is taking Hassan away from Kabul and at Amir’s graduation he states that he wishes Hassan could have been there.
The truth that Baba kept certain information hidden from Amir hurts so much because of two elements. Baba told Amir that the worst thing any person could do was to steal. He said that if you tell a lie or hide the facts then you are stealing the truth from the people involved. By not telling the truth about Hassan Baba has hidden the facts from both his children. It also suggests that Baba was embarrassed about Hassan on some level as he didn’t want to admit that his child was half-Hazara. Amir would have felt that his father didn’t trust him completely.
The cliché ‘like father, like son’ is true because both Baba and Amir hide the truth and this has devastating effects on the future. Baba has hidden Hassan’s true identity which leads to Hassan being left in Afghanistan and eventually leads to his death. Amir never admits to witnessing the assault on Hassan and therefore ruins his friendship with his best friend and brother.
When Amir speaks of his ‘oblivion’ he is speaking of the emptiness he feels now that he knows Hassan is dead and that his father lied to him.
This chapter is ended very effectively on several levels. Hosseini begins to close the chapter by making Amir have a dream in which Hassan is seen praying, muttering the mantra ‘a thousand times for you’, over his bloodied hands. Taliban men then come and shoot Hassan in the head. This tells us that Amir’s guilt still hangs heavy on him at this point in the book. He goes outside to get some air and accidently overhears Wahid, his host, and his wife arguing about food. There is none left because they gave it all to Amir. This reinforces just how poor and desperate many Afghan families have become under the Taliban regime.

The book is told in first person from the perspective of Amir. It begins in the middle of the story, when Amir gets a phone call in San Francisco in 2001 from Rahim Khan calling him back to Afghanistan. It then throws the reader back to Kabul in 1975 where it begins to follow the story of Amir’s childhood. This continues along through the rest of Amir’s life up until the point where he rescues and adopts Sohrab.
This is important as it means we look at the events in Kabul through the eyes of a reflective adult rather than the eyes of child. We have an adult reaction to the things that happen, but it also allows us as the reader to understand why the children and young adults react to things the way they do. For example, we understand that Amir feels he cannot stop the rape from happening because he is too cowardly and is afraid of the outcome for himself. We understand that Assef bullies others because he has insecurity issues about his own mixed race heritage.
In Chapter 7 there are two unusual points to the tale. There is a strange inclusion of a dream sequence told through Hassan. He is given a huge chunk of text to say. In this dream sequence he predicts the outcome of the kite tournament and his impending abuse at the hands of Assef through the metaphor of the lake monster that he and Amir defeat.
At the end of the chapter there is also a descriptive flashback of an Eid sacrifice whilst Hassan is being assaulted. In this scene Amir does not want to watch his friend being assaulted and he does not want to acknowledge that he should really be preventing it from happening. Instead he shuts his eyes and conjures up an image of the Eid sacrifice. During the Eid festival a sheep or goat is sacrificed to represent the loyalty of men to God. Amir remembers this now as Hassan is sacrificing himself out of his loyalty for Amir.
In Chapter 16 the narrative shifts to Rahim Khan as he relates the story of Hassan’s life and eventual death at the hands of the Taliban. Rahim Khan was closer than Amir to Hassan at this point and so it gives the story more emotional weight. We expect, because the story of Hassan has a lot of happy points to it, that his tale will end well. It is a shock when Rahim Khan eventually reveals Hassan’s death with the simple statement that the Taliban were committing genocide by ‘ridding’ Afghanistan of Hazaras.

At the beginning of Chapter 16 we hear Rahim Khan’s voice. Rather than relate the story of Hassan second-hand through Amir, Hosseini has chosen to tell it to us straight from Rahim Khan. This is a significant choice, as Rahim Khan would have been the closest person to Hassan in his later years and so when we are told about Hassan’s death it has a greater emotional impact.
Hassan had been living in Amir and Baba’s old house, helping Rahim Khan look after it for them. Hassan went to such pains to return the house to its former glory because he took a pride in his old home and he wanted to keep it ready for Baba and Amir’s return.
Hassan names his son Sohrab after the character in his favourite tale – Rostram and Sohrab. There is a certain irony in his name choice for his son as the Sohrab in the Arabic tale never knows who his true father is, much like Hassan is completely unaware that Baba is his biological parent.
There is a short paragraph about Hassan’s village which create an impression of it as a wasteland. First there is the rutted and dried track one musht drive along to reach it. The village is so hidden and unreachable that it either doesn’t have a name or people have forgotten it. The people who live there take no pride in their home as they have left a donkey carcass to rot at the side of the road. The plants and trees that have taken root there are all dying from a lack of water. The people live in what are described as mud huts creating a sense that life out there is primitive. Lastly, the mountains that shelter the village are compared with sharp teeth creating a sense that this area will eat you alive and that death in some form is always imminent.
For a very long time Amir has not bothered to think about Hassan or Afghanistan finding the topic of his childhood to painful and guilt-ridden. In contrast to this Hassan has thought constantly about his lost friend and has even gone to the trouble of learning to write so he can contact him. In his letter, Hassan asks a number of questions in between telling Amir all about himself and what life is like for him now with a son and wife. Hassan appears interested whereas Amir doesn’t want to go near the subject of their childhood or friendship and Amir has to be forced to do so by Rahim Khan.
Hassan had cleaned the house ‘like he was preparing for someone’s return’. This statement is odd because we know he was actually preparing it for someone’s return, specifically Amir’s. He wanted to see his old friend again to remind himself of a time before invasions and war had torn his homeland apart.
Sanaubar is Hassan’s mother, and she makes reappearance when Hassan is an adult. She takes great care of Sohrab. Firstly, this is because it is her only grandson, and so she naturally dotes on him. There is also an element here of making up for things that were lost. This is Sanaubar’s redemption. If she takes good care of Sohrab it might make up for her not being around to raise Hassan.

In chapter 9 it is Amir’s birthday. The presents he receives are listed to show us just how much he has been given (spoilt) but also that despite all these new play things he struggles to focus on anything. His mind is racing with the guilt and confusion of falling out with Hassan.
The colour of the bike being compared to that of blood is a reminder of the Eid sacrifice and therefore the assault on Assef.
Ali and Hassan get Amir a copy of the Shahnamah for his birthday. This is a brand new hardback copy of the stories Hassan and Amir read together under the pomegranate tree. Amir feels like crying when he receives this because so much thought and care has gone into selecting the present but at this point he and Hassan are not talking. It is a reminder to him of how good a friend Hassan truly is and how bad a friend Amir is currently being in not giving Hassan any support. At this point Amir is actually shunning him.
Amir frames Hassan, by making it look like Hassan was jealous of all his presents and hiding the watch and money under Hassan’s pillow. Amir does this in the hope that Baba will get mad and send Hassan away, that way Amir will no longer have to look at Hassan, who makes him constantly feel guilty. When Hassan is called in by Baba for questioning he actually admits to stealing the watch – even though he didn’t! He is still prepared to stick up for, and protect and defend, Amir no matter what it costs him.
Baba’s response is even more shocking. Instead of getting angry, as Amir was expecting, Baba immediately forgives Hassan. He doesn’t even shout, he just calmly tells Hassan that he is absolved. We are just as shocked as Amir. Obviously later, this weird moment of forgiveness is explained through the discovery that Hassan is actually Baba’s child. He would clearly not want to give up his son.
At the end of the chapter Hassan and Ali leave whilst Amir watches from the window. We are told that “all he saw was the rain through windowpanes that looked like melting silver.” Here the stormy downpour mirrors Amir’s terrible mood. He is heartbroken that Hassan is leaving but doesn’t know how to deal with it. The silver disappearing down the outside of the windowpane is like something precious getting away – Amir is losing his best friend.

Pomegranate tree
The Qu’ran mentions the pomegranate tree as one of the fruits in the garden of paradise. In Islam the pomegranate tree is one of the trees present in the garden of Paradise. In The Kite Runner there is a pomegranate tree in the cemetary where Amir and Hassan play. The fruit is also the colour of blood.

Slingshot
A simple but powerful weapon, they are used both as a domestic weapon and by military personnel. In Iraq’s recent past, slingshots became associated with insurgent groups/guerrilla warfare. . Hassan’s slingshot represents his devotion to Amir, and Sohrab uses his to finally defeat Assef.

Kites
Kites have been used throughout history for various purposes including sending a message in war time, sending prayers to heaven and as a form of entertainment.. During kite flying competitions two or more ‘sides’ are joined in confrontation. The kite flying itself needs two people to make it work properly – one to control the spool and one to control the line.

Harelip
A harelip is a congenital disorder. The lip fails to form properly within the womb, leaving a gap. With modern surgery this “deformity” is easily fixed.

Eid sacrifice
“Festival of Sacrifice” is an important Islamic holiday in which Muslims commemorate the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son, Ishmael, as an act of obedience to God, before God intervened to provide him with a sheep to sacrifice instead.

Rostam and Sohrab
The Shanemeh, (Book of Kings) tells of Rostam, a Persian hero, who kills his son, Sohrab, a champion swordsman, in a battle between Iran and Turan. Accounts vary as to whether Rostam knew Sohrab was his son. All accounts make clear Sohrab never knew his father. This story is Hassan’s favourite from the whole book.