Courage by dictionary definition is having the strength to face pain or grief. Additionally, it is the ability for one to be brave under certain adversities. In the book, The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini, courage is portrayed as the ability to bring light to the truth. People who do not cower behind deception and falsehood are people who are courageous. The reason why Amir thinks Soraya Taheri was a better person than himself, is because she does not hide behind a wall of lies. When Soraya and Amir first begun their relationship, Soraya explains how she doesn’t want to “start with secrets”. She wants her and Amir to begin their married with transparency, which means to not hide anything between them. However, Amir is falling short of the …show more content…
It is true that he showed some signs of bravery when he started talking to Soraya; however, he is very reluctant in admitting his wrongs, which does not make him courageous (as it is portrayed in the book). There’s a difference in being fearless and courageous. For someone to be fearless, he/she is not afraid of their adversaries, but for someone to be courageous, he/she has to admit to their wrongdoings. There are only a few characters who are courageous in the novel. Soraya is considered to be one of the courageous characters because she is not afraid of admitting her wrongs in the past. On the contrary, Amir and Hassan are both cowards. Hassan may be fearless and be able to take the beating and humiliation caused by the bullies, but he chose to lie about many things. He lied about stealing the watch and also took the blame for Amir multiple times. This only adds to Amir’s guilt because, at the same time, Amir is getting away with the wrong things he’d done. The reason why there are very little characters in the book who are courageous is because people are prone to avoiding the truth. People would rather lie about things that are embarrassing than to talk about them. This does not make them courageous, instead this makes them