Literary Devices in The Kite Runner

Dreams

The Pomegranate Tree

Foreshadowing

• Pg 63: Hassan tells Amir a dream he had about the two of them at Gharga Lake, in order to make Amir less nevrous about the tournament. In this dream the boys swim across the lake to prove that there is no monster at the bottom, and the lake is then renamed "Lake of Amir and Hassan, Sultans of Kabul" in honour of their bravery.
• Pg 65: Hassan mentions the dream again when he tells Amir "There's no monsters, just a beautiful day."
• Irony: There was a monster after all, but whether it is Assef, Amr's jealousy and desire for Baba's approval, or Amir himself, is unclear.
• Pg 91: Amir says " I thought about Hassan's dream.....I was the monster."

• Pg 59: "In the winter of 1975, I saw Hassan run a kite for the last time."
• Pg 63: When Hassan tells Amir of the dream that he had, he hints that a bad event involving a "monster" will happen, and in this case Amir turned out to be the monster.
• Pg 71: "Then he smiled his Hassan smile and disappeared around the corner. The next time I saw him smile unbashedly like that was twenty-six years later, in a faded Polaroid photograph.
• Pg 95: Amir asks Baba if he has ever thought about getting new servants.

Flashbacks

• Symbolism: the friendship between Hassan and Amir.
• At the beginning: a place of happiness and isolation from the outside world.
• After Hassan is raped: both boys lose their innocence and the bond is broken.
• Pg 98: Amir asks Hassan to go to the tree with him, then he proceeds to hit him with pomegranates, yelling at Hassan to hit him back. Hassan never does, instead he attacks himself.
• Amir does this because he is searching for a redmeption of his guilt, yet Hassan still remains loyal.
• The tree that used to represent a brothehood now represents the divions between the two boys.

• Pg 78-79: Amir has several flashbacks as he hides in the alleyway watching Hassan get raped.
• First: A memory of Ali talking about the fact that two boys who have fed from the same breast have a special brotherhood between them.
• Second: A memory of Hassan and Amir visiting a fortune-teller.
• Third: A dream of Amir being lost in a snowstorm yelling for help, until a hand reaches out and pulls him into a field.
• Pg 91: Amir rememembers the haunting look of accpetance on the sheep's face as it was killed during yearly the Eid rituals.

• When the Taliban seized power in 1996, kite-flying was outlawed because it was deemed "un-islamic".
• In late 2001, the Taliban was no longer in power and freedom was returned to the country.

Tone

Irony

The History of Kite Fighting

• confessional
• full of remorse

• Chapter 7
• Amir allows his friend to be raped in exchange for a prize (the kite) that he believes will earn him Baba's love.
• Baba's greatest concern regarding Amir is that he will grow up to be a man who can't stand up for what is right, shown by what he said to Rahim Khan earlier in the novel (pg 23).
• If Amir had stood up for Hassann but lost the kite in the process, he still could have proved that he has the courage to do the right thing even when it is frightening or dangerous to do so.
• He would have shown Baba that he is like him, but instead he runs away because he wants the kite to please Baba.
• Amir did the exact opposite of what Baba would have wanted.

• National past time in Afghanistan.
• Involves cutting eachother's lines while the kites fly in battle.
• The lines are coated in ground glass and wax to make them stronger.
• The last kite in the sky wins.
• People chase after all of the kites that fall to the ground - these are called the kite runners.
• It is a huge acheivment to find one of the last fallen kites and it is a custom that if you find a kite, you keep it.

Kites in The Kite Runner

• Metaphor: Hosseini describes the transition from fall to winter (pg 52) and he says " As the trees froze and the ice sheathed the roads, the chill between Baba and me thaws a little. And the reason for that was the kites.
• Kite fighting is the one thing that bonds Baba and Amir together.
• Pg 54: Amir demonstrates his jealousy towards Hassan when Baba takes the boys to both buy a new kite and Amir says "Sometimes I wished he wouldn't do that. Wished he'd let me be the favourite."
• Pg 59: Baba tells Amir that he thinks he can win the tournament and Amir gets the idea that if he wins and brings home the last fallen kite he can prove that he is a worthy son, and relieve the guilt for "killing his mother".
• Pg 71: Amir has just won the tournament and he says "That right there was the single greatest moment of my twelve years of life, seeing Baba on that roof, proud of me at last.

• Allusion to Afghan Traditions: Hosseini discusses all of the basic information we need to know about kite fighting: the tournaments take place in Winter, there are no rules, if you run a kite - you keep it, and the last kite still flying wins.
• This allusion helps the reader to visualize the Afghan culture and therefore better understand the novel.
• Symbolism: innocence and freedom (pg 52 - 57), Amir's desire for Baba's love (pg 59 - 60), and Amir's betrayal of Hassan (pg 76 - 82).
• Simile: "In Kabul, fighting kites was a little like going to war. As with any war, you had to prepare for battle." (pg 53)
• In this quote Hosseini compares kite fighting to going to war, which is actually ironic because shortly after the tournament war breaks out in Afghanistan.

Lambs

Literary Devices in The Kite Runner: Chapters 6-8

• In Islam religion the lamb signigies the sacrifice of an innocent. During Eid a lamb / sheep is blessed and then killed.
• Pg 81: As Amir watches Hassan get raped he says "It was a look I had seen before. It was the look of the lamb."
• The look that Amir talks about is one of resignation and acceptance, which is what he saw in Hassan's eyes.
• Pg 82: Amir realizes that maybe the lamb that he had to slay in order to win Baba's admiration was Hassan.