Who Is Nana In A Thousand Splendid Suns

In the beginning of the novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, a protagonist, Mariam, only five years old, is extremely naïve. She is caught in a reverie of Jalil, her father, in which she portrays him as the “father of the year”. In Mariam’s eyes, Jalil can do no wrong in any way, shape or form. However, Mariam’s mother, Nana, tries to convince her that Jalil is not the man she thinks. Nana tells Mariam stories of the way Jalil treats her, in hopes to shake Mariam’s mind of this false father- daughter bond. Mariam’s mother tells her: “Women like us. We endure. It’s all we have.” All Nana ever wants is to show Mariam what the real world is like outside of Gul Daman. She wants Mariam to know that when she is old enough to

Once Mariam and Rasheed start living together, she realizes that she has to work and do all of the chores. Life is not going to be like it was with Nana but instead she is about to suffer and endure with Rasheed the rest of her live. Enduring suffering is a reoccurring theme in the novel. Likewise, Laila, the daughter of one of her neighbors, is not even married yet, but she has to pick up the slack around her house because her mom is depressed after she hears her sons have died in the war. In Pakistan, age is but a number; women’s age means nothing to the society. All women suffer the same whether they suffer physically, mentally, or emotionally. Laila’s mother suffers emotional when she hears that her two sons die in the war. A vast majority of Pakistani women are forced to marry young and do whatever their husbands ask of them, ranging from cooking and cleaning to being forced to have sex. Along with that, almost all of them are beaten by their husbands, and are forced to wear a burqa when in public. The physical and mental abuse endured creates problems for women mentally as well. Nana says this powerful line to Mariam to warn her of the despicable future that lies ahead of her and other Pakistani