Alisa Feng

Ms. Wilson

AP English Literature and Composition

January 25, 2014

Voice of the Hazaras

AP Open Prompt 1987: Some novels and plays seem to advocate changes in social or political attitudes or in traditions. Choose such a novel or play and note briefly the particular attitudes or traditions that the author apparently wishes to modify. Then analyze the techniques the author uses to influence the reader’s or audience’s views. Avoid plot summary. 40 minutes.

Shopkeepers line the sides of a dirt road, selling everything from fabrics to lamb kebabs. Children run after each other, shouting and giggling, chasing after fallen kites. This is the image of Kabul, Afghanistan prior to the Soviet coup d’etat of the monarchy in 1979. Today it has been twenty five years since the last Soviet soldier left and over a decade since the Taliban was overthrown. However, the once-prosperous middle-eastern nation remains desolate: Violence and discrimination infect the land and a weak government struggles to prevent total anarchy. Meanwhile, Afghan locals are afraid to speak out, for fear of dire consequences; here, Khaled Hosseini aids Afghanistan’s surge towards progress. Throughout The Kite Runner, Hosseini writes for the persecuted Hazaras in Afghanistan by characterizing Hassan with heroic traits, dehumanizing the villainous Assef with references to Hitler as well as his own actions, and exposing the unnerving prevalence of discrimination throughout Afghan culture through daily interactions with total strangers.

In The Kite Runner, Hosseini identifies the persecuted Hassan with the audience before as a Hazara; in doing so, Hassan’s suffering becomes relatable for the audience and renders their sympathy. Throughout his novel, Hassan exposes the extent of Hazara suffering in a Pashtun-dominated region. In order to characterize Hassan and to highlight his inherent goodness, Hosseini juxtaposes him with Amir-- the privileged son of a wealthy businessman. While Amir taunts Hassan with his impressive vernacular, Hassan admires and love Amir unconditionally (Hoseini). Furthermore, Hosseini’s use of first person narration allows the reader access to Amir’s thoughts which also observe and remark upon the differences between himself and his Hazara friend; for example, when Amir comments that “Hassan had addressed Assef as agha” and wonders “what it must be like to live with such an ingrained sense of one’s place in a hierarchy”, the reader does as well (Hosseini 34). Small phrases such as these depict Hassan’s place in Afghan culture and invite the audience to sympathize with the bullied child. Throughout the novel, Hosseini continues to grow Hassan into the universal embodiment of purity—simply put, Hassan is very likable. Thus, any act against him is despicable and renders a strong audience reaction against the discrimination he experiences--  it is then that the audience recognizes Hassan as representative of an entire ethnic group: The Hazara people..

In order to effectively expose the extent of ethnic discrimination, Hosseini couples his humanization of Hassan with an extreme dehumanization of Assef to warn Afghanistan of the potential consequences stemming from unpunished crime and violence. The character of Assef is more than a playground bully: He is representative of anyone who assumes they are above another simply due to race and/or other differences. As a child, Hosseini develops Assef’s fascination with violence and his emotional disconnect by showcasing his brass knuckles, admiration of Adolf Hitler, and rape of Hassan. A clearly evil act, this begins the dehumanization of Assef; when he and Amir meet again as adults, Hosseini shows the path Assef has taken. He has become a “Talib”, entirely desensitized to violence, and commits unspeakable crimes against Sohrab, Hassan’s son, with his only justification being, “‘it’s just a Hazara’” (Hosseini 221). Hosseini’s repetition of this single phrase shows the stagnant mindset of Assef, however the tragedy lies in the fact that this mindset is far from unique in modern Afghanistan. Laws forbidding criminal activity are weak and the punishments executed even less adequate. This has allowed the violence of Afghanistan’s past to continually ransack the present and influence the future. The role of Assef is to act as a warning for Afghanistan’s government that, lest they be cautious and much more vigilant about enforcing laws and punishment, “bad people who stay bad” (Hosseini 356) will continue advancing.

While Assef specifically targets Hassan, Hosseini highlights the general prevalence of anti-Hazara sentiment in Afghanistan through Hassan’s brief encounters with total strangers. When they are children, Amir and Hassan are unaware of the implications of their friendship; however, society has not failed to take notice. As they walk to the cinema, “a group of soldiers…leered…and called out to Hassan”, taunting him with insults directed towards his mother (Hosseini 16). Years later, when Amir looks for Hassan following the kite running tournament, a vendor asks him, “’What’s a boy like you doing out at this time…looking for a Hazara?’” (Hosseini 67). Through these brief meetings, some of which are only a few lines long, Hosseini successfully stereotypes all of Afghanistan. With Amir and Baba as the clear exceptions, Afghans throughout Kabul are clearly hostile towards the Hazara people. The commonality of the encounters only serve to render them more disturbing as the discrimination is supremely dominant and effortlessly exposed through daily interactions. This technique is subtle but elegantly effective; the reader subconsciously observes widespread racism throughout the three-hundred-seventy-one pages of text and the eventual realization is one that cannot be ignored.

Through his bestseller, The Kite Runner, Hosseini has done more with his artistry than tell a story. By siphoning endless sympathy for Hassan, depicting the most horrendous product of unpunished crime, and revealing the prevalence of discrimination in Afghanistan, Hosseini has built a political platform campaigning for reform and equality. Even though Afghanistan has been reduced to little more than a bullet-riddled wasteland by its nightmarish past, Hosseini maintains hope that, with the correct mindset of progressiveness, the once-great nation may be restored.

40 minutes