The Kite Runner – Past Events

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini illustrates the effects of past events on Amir’s present actions, attitudes, and values. The effects were both positive and negative. Past events can “change the course of a whole lifetime”. The raping event that happened during Amir’s childhood affects his actions even during his adulthood. After the rape event, Amir feels guilt and that guilt made him go on the road of redemption. The actions of Amir saving Sohrab were driven by this guilt from the past.

Those actions were not done by a man with “no conscience, no goodness” but a man trying to find “a way to be good again”. During the fight with Assef, Amir laughs and is happy because he feels that the pain he is receiving is equivalent to the pain Hassan received in the past. So Amir feels that he and Hassan are now on equal terms.

Past events affect a character’s actions so therefore also affect their attitude.

In the past, Amir tries to get acceptance from Baba because Amir knows he is not the intrepid person that Baba wants him to be. Baba thinks that Amir would “become a man who can’t stand up to anything”. So whenever Amir is facing a problem as an adult, he tries to disprove his father and changes his attitude to an attitude of a man who stands up for things he loves. The values of a character can change depending on their attitude of past events.

The separation of Amir and Hassan in the past affected the values of Amir in the present. Amir starts to value his past friendship with Hassan because “it hurts more to have and lose than not have in the first place”. So in turn, Amir values Sohrab because part of Hassan lives in Sohrab. Through Sohrab was the only way Amir could reunite with Hassan. Amir values his wife Soraya because she fills the void in his life that Hassan leaves. Just because the past has past doesn’t mean it can’t affect the future. Khaled Hosseini conveys this in the Kite Runner. The characters were bound to the past and it shows this from their actions, attitude, and values.