The Kite Runner Chapter 4 Quotes
The Kite Runner Chapter 4 Quotes
How we cite the quotes:
Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote 7
Then, Baba and I drove off in his black Ford Mustang – a car that drew envious looks everywhere because it was the same car Steve McQueen had driven in Bullitt, a film that played in one theater for six months. (4.10)
This black Ford Mustang goes part and parcel with Baba's conception of manhood. (We can't help but notice the touch of irony later when Baba gives Amir an American muscle car – a Gran Torino – as a graduation present. The muscle car, once the hottest thing on the road, is actually eleven years old by the time Baba gives it to Amir.) How does Hosseini mythologize Baba and other Afghan men and simultaneously mock them? How does Amir, in his own life, diverge from his father's ideas of masculinity? In what ways does he subscribe to them?
I read it to him in the living room by the marble fireplace. No playful straying from the words this time; this was about me! Hassan was the perfect audience in many ways, totally immersed in the tale, his face shifting with the changing tones in the story. When I read the last sentence, he made a muted clapping sound with his hands.
"Mashallah, Amir agha. Bravo!" He was beaming.
"You liked it?" I said, getting my second taste – and how sweet it was – of a positive review.
"Some day, Inshallah, you will be a great writer," Hassan said. "And people all over the world will read your stories."
"You exaggerate, Hassan," I said, loving him for it.
"No. You will be great and famous," he insisted. (4.52-57)
If we were to ask you (we're asking you) who admires whom in The Kite Runner, how would you respond? Your first answer would surely be: Amir admires Baba. Most of the events in the novel happen because Amir never gets the love he needs from Baba. Amir's jealousy of Hassan drives him to do some pretty terrible things. But don't forget the other story of devotion and admiration in The Kite Runner: Hassan's unflagging admiration for Amir.
Quote 9
That Hassan would grow up illiterate like Ali and most Hazaras had been decided the minute he had been born, perhaps even the moment he had been conceived in Sanaubar's unwelcoming womb – after all, what use did a servant have for the written word? But despite his illiteracy, or maybe because of it, Hassan was drawn to the mystery of words, seduced by a secret world forbidden to him. I read him poems and stories, sometimes riddles – though I stopped reading those when I saw he was far better at solving them than I was. (4.12)
Here, literature isn't sugar and spice and everything nice. Amir actually uses his mastery of reading to belittle Hassan. Even though Hassan sees the beauty of literature (like Amir), Amir actually stops reading Hassan riddles when the activity no longer confirms Amir's superior status. Sometimes we think of literature as self-exploration, or a way to bring human beings together. Not here, pal. Literature is power. And Amir uses its power against Hassan – who, unlike Amir, seems to have Baba's love.