Review of Five Articles on Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner

This article compared two books about Afghanistan that were very different from each other: The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan, written by Ben Macintyre and the Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. The critic of this book review, Nancy Graves, says that both of these books give accurate and well-detailed insights to the Afghanistan culture. Graves goes moreover by explaining how Khaled Hosseini wrote the novel based on his memories of his life in Kabul. Like Amir (the main character in the Kite Runner), Hosseini was also born in Kabul and later moves to California. Another similarity between Amir and Hosseini is that both of their fathers were looked up to by people in their society. Hosseini’s father served in the Afghan diplomatic corps, much like Amir’s father who is a high figure in the society within the story. I also learned other background information on Hosseini’s life. One being that Hosseini was posted at Paris at the time of the Russian Invasion of Afghanistan. Hosseini ends up asking for and receiving political asylum and he and his family move to Los Angeles, where Hosseini becomes a physician, and later a novelist.

This article is more of an interview type of review with the author of The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini. Hosseini tells interviewer, Ray Conlouge, about how Amir’s life, in The Kite Runner, was almost a biography of his life growing up. After giving a brief summary of the story, Conlouge talks about the tribe-based racism that motivated Assef’s attack, and how Hosseini believes that this racial injustice is not only the reason for Amir’s betrayal to his childhood best friend, but also key to Afghanistan’s self-destruction. Hosseini explains by saying “And it continues. The ministers now in the government used to be up in the mountains shooting rockets at each other. Tribal rivalries separate them, and without the American presence, it could escalate back to civil war”. Hosseini goes further into his perspective on Afghanistan by comparing himself to Amir once again, by saying Amir had began to wonder if Afghanistan was completely hopeless much like he and his wife wonder today. While Hosseini and his wife, keep much of their Afghanistan heritage by teaching their children the language and eating Afgahn food at home, they still see present day Afghanistan as “shattered” and “dangerous”.

This is an interview of Khaled Hosseini by Tamara Jones. It’s mostly Hosseini explaining in detail the poverty and dangers of city of Kabul. He talks about how once when he was in the hospital he experienced a family being told their child was going to die because the hospital lacked medicine. He also explains how the women have to go get firewood to cook with and that their biggest fear is getting abducted and raped on their walk to get firewood. Hosseini also talks about how he was two third of the way finished with writing “The Kite Runner” when the attack on the twin towers happened. Hosseini says he was very close to not publishing the book because of Afghanistan being seen in America as the “bad guy”, however changes his mind in hopes that his new book could “maybe show another face of Afghanistan”.

This was a broadcast transcript done by npr.org talking about the new upcoming movie “The Kite Runner” based on Khaled Hosseini’s novel. The anchor woman was talking about how the movie’s release date is still being debated about due to a safety concern for the Afghanistanian children who were supposed to cast in the upcoming film. Thh newswoman talks about how not only the rape scene within the movie, but also the general portrayal of Afghanistan could be a serious threat to the actors in the movie. Paramount pictures states that everyone hopes that in a couple of months all of the threats will die down and the children will be able to return to Afghanistan, however if they can not go back the studio is prepared to see them through it.

This was an informative article about Afghanistan and it’s different social levels. I think this will be helpful when talking about Amir’s embarrassment for being Hassan’s friend due to an ethical social issue. It says in the article that the country has completely split apart due to the ethnicity differences. I feel like this will help out when talking about Amir’s actions and looking into the background from which he made them.