Guilt In The Kite Runner

“True redemption is when redemption leads to good” (Khaled Hosseini). In Khaled Hosseini’s fiction novel The Kite Runner, Amir suffers emotional turmoil while carrying the burden of his mistakes, mainly towards his best friend Hassan. As the novel progresses, he dedicates the rest of his life to escaping his guilt, gradually taking minor steps towards confrontation. His efforts to reconcile allows him to find peace in himself as well as a sense of fulfillment. Amir’s pent up guilt continuously changes his physical and mental environment, eventually making way for redemption and new life.
Hosseini utilizes the contrast between Amir’s past aspirations with his present goals to represent how guilt changes one’s world from purposeful to miserable.

Amir begins to acknowledge the dissimilarity of his and Baba’s satisfaction with their new life in America; while Baba faces hardships and toil, Amir states that “For [him] America was a place to bury [his] memories” (Hosseini 129). Because his culpability haunts him daily, Amir believes that undergoing a change of surroundings will erase all his past mistakes. Guilt also manifests in his American life as he feels apologetic for Baba’s continuous hard work to make ends meet. This is significant because guilt continuously follows Amir around as if it is his shadow. He cannot truly escape accountability which foreshadows later on in his life. Although Amir discovers an opportunity to restart his life in America, he cannot suppress past memories of his youth. While pursuing Soraya, she tells him of her aspirations of being a teacher and describes the feeling of fulfillment in teaching literacy. In response, Amir thinks about how he “used [his] literacy to ridicule Hassan. How [he] teased him about big words he didn’t know” (Hosseini 151). Because Amir’s guilty memory of mocking Hassan reappears, it exhibits how Amir still regrets his behaviors, even years later. Additionally, the contrast between Soraya’s good and Amir’s negative actions must compel him to feel shameful and reflect on his conducts in the present. No matter how hard he tries to

Although Amir initially rejects Rahim Khan’s plea to find Hassan’s son, Sohrab; he realizes the importance of Hassan’s son. He reflects on how “Hassan had loved [him] once, loved [him] in a way that no one ever had or ever would again. He was gone now, but a part of him lived on. It was in Kabul. Waiting” (Hosseini 227). Because Hassan has passed away, Amir sees the rescue of Sohrab as one way to finally erase the pain of his wrongdoings. Not only does he realize the importance of the retrieval, but Amir also begins to understand how much Hassan loves him. In his youth, he only thought of Hassan as another Hazara servant. However, now that he’s gone, Amir recognizes how much Hassan meant to him in a way his younger self would never acknowledge. This regret most likely sparked determination to reconnect with Hassan’s last vessel. All these emotions and lost memories inspire Amir to take the troublesome and thorny path to his redemption. Amid the physical violence between Assef and Amir, Amir begins to laugh. Thoughts sprang to his head, saying, “My body was broken- just how badly I wouldn’t find out until later- but I felt healed. Healed at last. I laughed” (Hosseini 289). At that moment, Amir laughs because he feels his wrongdoings are being withdrawn. Towards the story’s beginning, Amir tries to provoke Hassan by attacking him