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Perseverance In A Thousand Splendid Suns

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Isaac Lee Mrs. Clowe English 10H 10 April 2024 Title The world is filled with suffering, pain, and death. Society needs hope, courage, and perseverance to overcome its imperfections. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini illustrates the life of Mariam. As she navigates life, she encounters life-changing experiences, including the death of loved ones, oppression, and rejection, requiring resilience and hope to overcome her hardships. Mariam demonstrates courage and perseverance through her sacrifices for Laila and her kids, overcoming her identity as a harami, and enduring the loss of her own children and her mother. Mariam makes significant sacrifices for others’ well-being. Enduring a loveless marriage to Rasheed, she ultimately sacrifices …show more content…

He really means to. And Mariam could not, would not, allow that to happen” (Hosseini 348). Mariam’s unconditional love for her children and Laila compels her to grab a shovel and strike Rasheed with all her strength. This act of Mariam killing her husband portrays not only courage, but also, her strength and bravery. Despite being oppressed by Rasheed for so long, Mariam takes courageous action. “‘I admit to what I did, brother,’ Mariam said. ‘But if I [had not], he would have killed her’” (Hosseini 365). Mariam herself could not even believe her actions, but she justified them by saving Laila’s life. She had always stayed away from violence and just accepted her fate. However, when one of her loved ones was in mortal danger, Mariam’s sacrificial heart compelled her to act, regardless of the consequences. She was unafraid to speak at her trial, displaying her courage to face the consequences in court. Mariam also discovers courage by accepting her fate as a harami, an illegitimate child. This identity shaped her worldview from a young girl to an adult. Mariam knew that being a harami was “a source of shame [for] her father and his family” (Hosseini, …show more content…

Give sustenance to me” (Hosseini 96). Before Mariam’s prayer, she had just created a burial for her miscarried child. This indicates that she was not willing to let go of her loss until she prayed to Allah for guidance. Determination not to let her imperfections define her and to seek comfort and guidance from God is why she developed a close connection with Laila’s children, Aziza and Zalmai. Mariam is a true example of perseverance through the loss of her mother and her baby. Mariam’s world was filled with suffering, pain, and death, yet it produced courage and perseverance in her. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini portrays how Mariam’s sacrifices and unwavering courage in protecting her loved ones, her acceptance of her identity, and her perseverance through loss underscore the fundamental importance of courage and perseverance in navigating life’s challenges, even in a world without suffering. These virtues, deeply ingrained in the human experience, serve as guiding lights, inspiring society to endure, to fight for what society believes in, and to find strength in the face of adversity, ultimately shaping the very fabric of the world’s

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Laila was forced by the fear of being punished for having a child out of wedlock. Mariam and Laila both had very different reasons for ending up with Rasheed. Mariam had been completely forced and torturing her but Laila was out of the need to not be punished for having a child without

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The injustice Mariam endures in the novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, leads Mariam on a struggling journey impacting her future path in life. The injustice that Mariam endures leaves a permanent mark on her life and impacts her from the beginning. Life wasted no time throwing the cruel injustices of life at Mariam. Mariam was marked a harami, otherwise known as a child without a father, even though her father Jalil was alive, near, and well. “She understood then what Nana meant, that a harami was an unwanted thing: that she, Mariam, was an illegitimate person that would never have legitimate claim to the things other people had, things such as love, family, home, acceptance.”

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In the novel Mariam sacrifices her life for Laila and also her freedom for Jalil. Like Jesus, Mariam willingly sacrificed herself and when she descended from the truck to be killed, her “legs did not buckle. Her arms did not flail. She did not have to be dragged. ”(369).

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While Mariam was denied an education, and her husband is very against the ideals of women’s rights, Laila is growing up under much different circumstances. Both the ideals of her father, and the changing ideals of Afghanistan have allowed her to go to school and to pursue things in life beyond marriage. Here we see all that Mariam has lot; supportive friendships, knowledge, and an ability to grow up experiencing life for herself. In fact, Rasheed looks down upon Laila’s father, Babi, for not further controlling his wife. It’s a tragedy that Mariam was never even given a chance to grow to her full potential, being the bright and positive young girl she was, due to both her marriage and societal opinion about women’s education being an unnecessary thing, even a thing that is looked down upon by men such as Rasheed.

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“I admit to what I did, brother,” Mariam said, “But, if I hadn’t, he would have killed her. He was strangling her” (P365). This shows that Mariam is willing to take responsibility for her action she knew that there would be conscious, but she also knew that what she did was to save Laila and her children. Mariam’s actions would lead to this moment, “Kneel here, hamshira. And look down.”

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