Redemption in Kahled Hosseini's The Kite Runner Kayleigh Parham 12th Grade

From the wealthiest neighborhood in Kabul to the poverty of San Francisco, Khaled Hosseini creates a story of redemption which transcends cultures and time in The Kite Runner. Hosseini uses the dynamics of father-son relationships to express a theme of atonement, using a web of tragedy to bring his readers the assurance that there is always "a way to be good again" (92).

Hosseini begins the novel through a image which synopizes Amir's relationship with his father: sitting outside his father’s study solemnly soaking in second-hand affections as his father jokes and laughs with his business partners. Amir's desperate need for his father's approval is the driving force behind his actions as a child. He grows to resent both himself and his closest companion Hassan, a Hazara boy that works as a servant in Amir's home. Amir's father withholds love only to bestow graciously on Hassan. In response to his father's great act of charity towards Hassan, Amir admits his feeling of resentment. As Hassan is told Amir's father is financing a cosmetic surgery as a birthday gift to Hassan, Amir admits: "I wished I too had some kind of scar that would beget Baba's sympathy. It wasn't fair. Hassan...