Long-Running Themes In The Kite Runner By Khaled Hosseini

"You can never go home again, but the truth is you can never leave home, so it’s all right" (Maya Angelou). In the novel "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini, there are long-running themes of tradition, betrayal, forgiveness, and love. All of these themes stem from the motif of home. Home will never leave you and will influence you no matter what you do, and three characters encapsulate this idea perfectly. Firstly, General Taheri is a man who strictly abides by Afghan traditions and culture, Baba has a difficult time adjusting to his new home in the United States of America, and Amir is stuck in the past and is consistently haunted by the demons from his past.

Firstly, General Taheri is an excellent example of home never leaving an individual.

When Amir moved to America, he thinks of it as a chance to finally escape from his childhood, but ultimately, his demons have yet to be exorcized as they are still within him. The root of Amir’s past haunting him is when he left Hassan and did not bother saving him when he is getting raped by Assef. This happened to Amir as a child, but due to the invasion, he is never able to rekindle and fix things with Hassan, making Amir feel guilt and regret for his actions for decades, and this guilt will never leave Amir. Moving to America helped him with it, but the feelings of guilt still stayed. This is proven by how Amir melancholy talks about Hassan, with him saying, "I wondered what he was doing, where he was living, whether he had a wife and children. Mostly, I wondered what had happened to him that day in the winter of 1975, after I left him in the alley, alone and broken, at the mercy of Assef and his friends." (Hosseini 1). This demonstrates that Amir is still affected by the betrayal and that his past still concerns him because it has remained a part of him over time. Despite having a difficult upbringing, Amir still feels a great connection to his childhood house because the emotional bonds he made there were robust and hard to break. Amir grows closer to his home as he learns to accept his past, live with his past, and find forgiveness rather than trying to forget it. He did not change and adopt the American way of life; instead, he retained the rich culture that helped to mould him into the unique person he is today. Moreover, Amir learns the truth about everything and decides to rescue Sohrab. He returns in order to atone for his previous misdeeds and fulfill his obligation to Hassan from decades earlier. Amir is staying at home because he went above and beyond to save Sohrab. He did this as an act of atonement because he is aware of the suffering