Guilt. It can dictate one’s entire life. It can turn a life around. In Khaled Hosseini’s novel, The Kite Runner, Amir is consumed by guilt. His entire life revolves around one experience: the remorse of not helping a friend. The one bright day of kite running that turns to darkness. The day that results in an experience that he has spent his entire life trying to move on from. As Amir progresses through life trying to reclaim himself, Hosseini displays that no matter how grand one’s misconduct is, if he or she truly is looking for redemption it will be achieved.
As children, individuals often act in ways that will please their parents. Amir lives a childhood full of wanting to please his father. He believes it is his fault for killing his …show more content…
Amir has developed into the strong son Baba always wanted. He is now able to fight for himself and others. With the help of Rahim Khan, Amir realizes “there is always a way to be good again” (page 2). Ironically, Amir spreads kindness in the same way that he spread lies when he was young: he plants money under a mattress to help a family in need, rather than labeling Hassan as a thief. Moreover, he truly is on the path to fixing his sins when Amir does not let Sohrab be raped by the same man who raped Hassan. Instead, Amir allows Assef to brutally hurt him and that is the “first time since the [rape incident] [that] [Amir] feels at peace” (page 303). He finally pays for what he did not do as a child and now as he stands up to Assef he is also standing up for Hassan. Amir’s wounds, including the scar across his lip, do not amount to the grief he had been feeling since running away from helping Hassan. By standing up to the Taliban, for a Hazara, Amir is sacrificing himself as a lamb. Amir achieves redemption when he adopts Sohrab and accepts him to be his own son. Sohrab is given the life his father was stripped of, a life full of the opportunity to be happy. Now it is he who is the kite flyer and Amir is the one who takes the beatings of the glass string. A life that one day turned dark is slowly regaining light because of a desire to be free of
As children, individuals often act in ways that will please their parents. Amir lives a childhood full of wanting to please his father. He believes it is his fault for killing his …show more content…
Amir has developed into the strong son Baba always wanted. He is now able to fight for himself and others. With the help of Rahim Khan, Amir realizes “there is always a way to be good again” (page 2). Ironically, Amir spreads kindness in the same way that he spread lies when he was young: he plants money under a mattress to help a family in need, rather than labeling Hassan as a thief. Moreover, he truly is on the path to fixing his sins when Amir does not let Sohrab be raped by the same man who raped Hassan. Instead, Amir allows Assef to brutally hurt him and that is the “first time since the [rape incident] [that] [Amir] feels at peace” (page 303). He finally pays for what he did not do as a child and now as he stands up to Assef he is also standing up for Hassan. Amir’s wounds, including the scar across his lip, do not amount to the grief he had been feeling since running away from helping Hassan. By standing up to the Taliban, for a Hazara, Amir is sacrificing himself as a lamb. Amir achieves redemption when he adopts Sohrab and accepts him to be his own son. Sohrab is given the life his father was stripped of, a life full of the opportunity to be happy. Now it is he who is the kite flyer and Amir is the one who takes the beatings of the glass string. A life that one day turned dark is slowly regaining light because of a desire to be free of