Theme Of Loyalty In The Kite Runner

The theme of loyalty has a major impact on how the Kite Runner develops. As the novel unfolds, the characters begin to learn that loyalty comes with both positive and negative connotations. Loyalty is putting your trust and faith into someone else's hands, although this can be broken, resulting in destroyed lives and relationships. These destroyed lives and relationships are how loyalty affects the novel. Loyalty will drive you to do stuff you would never have seen yourself doing, even loyalty that has been broken will make one seek redemption and attempt to gain it back. There are many examples of loyalty depicted throughout the novel, one being Hassan’s loyalty towards Amir. Hassan constantly shows loyalty towards Amir in the novel. An ideal example of this loyalty is when Hassan is surrounded by Assef and his boys in an empty alleyway. Assef tells Hassan that he will let him go, untouched,

Nothing shows Hassan’s loyalty more than when he was raped by Assef. This event really showed how loyal Hassan is to Amir and how much he really values his friendship with him. Another significant example of loyalty being portrayed in the novel is Assefs loyalty to God. When Amir encounters Assef in his return to Kabul, Assef has become a disreputable felon, murderer, and a member of the Taliban. Assef believes that his actions show his loyalty to God. His own conceptions about God and God's plans led him to kill and harm several innocent lives, “free of guilt and remorse, knowing you are virtuous, good, and decent. Knowing you’re doing God’s work” (290). Assef really believed that he was doing what God wanted him to do, even if it was killing his own people. This shows that not all types of loyalty are honorable. One might see this example as just being cruel and evil, it certainly is, but it’s also a depiction of loyalty because Assef believes that that’s what God wants him to do and he will do it because he is faithful to