The Kite Runner Chapter 8 Quotes
The Kite Runner Chapter 8 Quotes
How we cite the quotes:
Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Early that spring, a few days before the new school year started, Baba and I were planting tulips in the garden. Most of the snow had melted and the hills in the north were already dotted with patches of green grass. It was a cool, gray morning, and Baba was squatting next to me, digging the soil and planting the bulbs I handed to him. He was telling me how most people thought it was better to plant tulips in the fall and how that wasn't true, when I came right out and said it. "Baba, have you ever thought about get ting new servants?" (8.63)
Amir's question, of course, must pain Baba quite a bit since Hassan is his son. It seems Amir can't handle anything that reminds him of his cowardice, even if it's his best friend. Unlike Amir, Baba keeps the reminders of his guilt around. (Those reminders would be Ali and Hassan since Baba slept with Ali's wife and fathered Hassan.) Do you blame Amir absolutely for Hassan and Ali's departure? Does some unconscious part of Amir send Hassan and Ali away so he can have Baba all to himself?
Quote 2
I was eighteen. Her name was Homaira. She was a Hazara, the daughter of our neighbor's servants. [...]
He took a long gulp of his scotch. Coughed. "You should have seen the look on my father's face when I told him. My mother actually fainted. My sisters splashed her face with water. They fanned her and looked at me as if I had slit her throat. My brother Jalal actually went to fetch his hunting rifle before my father stopped him." Rahim Khan barked a bitter laughter. "It was Homaira and me against the world. And I'll tell you this, Amir jan: In the end, the world always wins. That's just the way of things." (8.133-136)
Rahim Khan is telling Amir about an early romance of his with a Hazara woman named Homaira. (Don't forget that Rahim Khan's romance with Homaira parallels Baba's romance with Sanaubar.) The reactions from Rahim Khan's family might strike you as outlandish. Perhaps, though, they tell us a little about the distance between Hazaras and Pashtuns in the Afghanistan of Rahim Khan's early adulthood. Marriage binds two families together and you can see – pretty clearly – the fear expressed by Rahim Khan's mother (she faints) and his brother (he goes to get his gun). But we might want to disagree with Rahim Khan's last statement. Does "the world" always win? In the novel, do social prejudices win out over Amir's love for Hassan? Is Amir's rescue of Sohrab successful?
Quote 3
I turned thirteen that summer of 1976, Afghanistan's next to last summer of peace and anonymity. Things between Baba and me were already cooling off again. I think what started it was the stupid comment I'd made the day we were planting tulips, about getting new servants. I regretted saying it – I really did – but I think even if I hadn't, our happy little interlude would have come to an end. Maybe not quite so soon, but it would have. By the end of the summer, the scraping of spoon and fork against the plate had replaced dinner table chatter and Baba had resumed retreating to his study after supper. And closing the door. I'd gone back to thumbing through Hãfez and Khayyám, gnawing my nails down to the cuticles, writing stories. I kept the stories in a stack under my bed, keeping them just in case, though I doubted Baba would ever again ask me to read them to him. (8.94)
Writing becomes a very complex activity here. Amir stacks his short stories under the bed, hoping Baba will someday want to hear them. Amir also compares writing to a nervous habit like biting his nails. Is writing really an anxiety-based habit? What does Amir have to be anxious about at this point in the story? Why would Amir think writing could help his relationship with his father?