Role Of Mother In A Thousand Splendid Suns

Sacrifices of Parents How many types of women are there in this world? How many of these women in the world are a good mother figure and who is not a good mother figure? In the novel A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini uses different ways to show the sacrifices of different parents through Mammy, Nana, Mariam, and Laila. The first type of mother is the good mother, which represents love, protection, and nourishment. A good mother is one who wants the best for the child, and to make the best decisions, which the mothers, Mariam and Laila always did. Even though Mariam never had a child of her own, she loved and took care of Laila’s child like one of her own. Mariam was sad to hear that could not have a child of her own, but she became …show more content…
In the house, Mariam is the one who cooks and prepares the meal for the family, since they do not have money, she does the best she can to make sure they have food on the table when it is time to eat. She is the one who protects Laila when Rasheed beats her. For example, “The first thing she saw when she sat up was Rasheed. He was lying on his back, staring at nothing with an unblinking, fish-mouthed expression. A bit of foam, lightly pink, had dribbled from his mouth down his cheek…oh, Mariam” (351). She did not care that she was killing him, because she was too busy saving Laila’s life. Laila made a sad decision to put Aziza, her daughter, in an orphanage. “If she was lucky, she was given a tongue-lashing or a single kick to the rear, a shove in the back. Other times, she met with assortments of wooden clubs, fresh tree branches, short whips, …show more content…
The two women in this novel that goes along with the terrible mother would be Mammy and Nana. One way of showing that Nana was being a terrible mother when the novel starts off with “Mariam was five years old the first time she heard the word harami” (3). “At that time, Mariam did not understand. She did not know what this word harami-bastard-meant” (4). Nana did say that she loves Mariam, “I am the only one who loves you. I’m all you have in this world, Mariam, and when I’m gone you’ll have nothing. You’ll have nothing. You are nothing! Nana did not want Mariam to leave her. “I’ll die if you go. The jinn will come, and I’ll have one of my fits. You’ll see, I’ll swallow my tongue and die. Don’t leave me, Mariam Jo. Please stay. I’ll die if you go” (27). Nana is showing positive and negative emotions by telling Mariam she is noting and then telling her not to leave me. Mammy was also a terrible mother to Laila. Mammy forgot to pick up Laila from school one day and she told Mammy about the boy who shot urine in her hair. Mammy did not care about that when she said “That’s…that’s terrible. God. I’m sorry. Poor you. I’ll have a talk with him first thing in the morning. Or maybe with his mother. Yes, that would be better, I think” (124). Then Mammy said “I won’t forget tomorrow, I promise” Laila said, “You said that yesterday” (125). Mammy never started a conversation with Laila. Laila