Gerbec 1
Readers Journal #3
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Citation
“I sat on the park bench, watched a man toss
a football to his son, telling him to not
sidearm the ball, to throw over the shoulder.
I glanced up and saw a pair of kites, red with
long blue tails.” (Hosseini 202).
“I lay in the dark the night Rahim Khan
called and traced with my eyes the parallel
silver lines on the wall made by moonlight
pouring through the blinds.” (Hosseini 204).
“The plane taxied out of the terminal, and
soon, we were airborne, cutting through the
clouds.” (Hosseini 204).
“My driver, a chain-smoking, sweaty little
man who introduced himself as Gholam,
drove nonchalantly and recklessly, averting
collisions by the thinnest of margins, all
without so much as a pause in the incessant
stream of words spewing from his mouth…”
Analysis
Narrator talks about how he saw a father
teaching his son to play football, then seeing
two kites sailing in the sky. Both of these
things can relate to Amir’s childhood, and it
makes me think that the author purposely
put that narration exactly when Amir found
out he had to go back to Afghanistan.
Amir’s father never played football with
him, or bonded with him in any type of
manner like that. The kite flyers remind
Amir of when he was a kite runner, and won
for the first time with Hassan. Is there a
connection between the things Amir just
saw in the park and him going back to
Afghanistan? Or was this a coincidence?
Use of literary device; personification. The
moonlight pouring in through the blinds is
personification because the author is giving
human characteristics to a non-living thing
in order to emphasize how eerie and smooth
the light was coming in through the blinds;
almost as if the moonlight was water being
poured through the slats.
Use of literary device; metaphor. The plane
was cutting through the clouds is a metaphor
used to emphasize how fast the plane was
going, almost as if it were actually cutting
through the clouds; not just flying through
them.
Use of literary device; metaphor. The
incessant stream of words spewing from his
mouth is a metaphor because the author is
comparing the Gholam’s non stop talking to
an incessant stream. He does this because he
wants to emphasize just how much the

(Hosseini 205).
“The bustle of the city blurring past
reminded me of a busier, more crowded
version of the Kabul I knew, particularly of
the Kocheh-Morgha, or Chicken Bazaar,
where Hassan and I used to buy chutney-
dipped potatoes and cherry water.”
(Hosseini 205).
“I told him I had written short stories in the
leather-bound notebook he’d given me, but
he didn’t remember.” (Hosseini 208).
“I was old enough to be his grandfather and
I was sitting there, blood gushing down my
face, apologizing to that son of a dog.”
(Hosseini 209).
“ ‘You sounded like your father just now.’ ”
(Hosseini 212).
“Those thorny old barbs of guilt bore into
me once more, as if speaking his name had
broken a spell, set them free to torment me
anew.” (Hosseini 212).
Gerbec 2
driver was talking, without so much as a
pause.
Author brings up Amir’s past, particularly
his past friendship with Hassan. Is this the
author foreshadowing the reentering of
Hassan in Amir’s life? Or was this just a
happy reminder of his home country and
friendship with Hassan?
This caught my attention. It’s interesting to
see how sentimental that book was to Amir,
but Rahim Khan had somehow forgotten.
Was this because of Rahim Khan’s
sickness? Or was the meaning of the book to
Rahim not as important to Amir? Maybe the
book was so important to Amir because
Rahim was one of the only people who
supported Amir when he first started
writing, apart from Hassan.
The phrase: Son of a dog, was used by
Amir’s father, a couple chapters back. Was
this a common phrase in Afghanistan? Or
was this a common phrase Amir’s father and
his friends used? Was this just a phrase the
author liked to use when talking about
disgraceful people?
When Rahim Khan said this to Amir, how
was Amir feeling about that? Was he finally
happy that he was more like his father than
his father realized? Was that painful for him
to hear that since his father passed away?
Why didn’t the narrator talk about his
feelings when Rahim said this?
Use of literary device; metaphor. The author
uses this metaphor to compare how straining
the mention of Hassan was to Amir, and
how all of Amir’s guilt was brought back to
him. Does Rahim’s mention of Hassan mean
Amir will finally be able to see him again
after all of these years?

“I would take a walk in the Karteh-Parwan
section-where the melon vendors used to
hang out in the old days, you remember that
spot?...” (Hosseini 214).
Chapter sixteen, page 214 to 225.
“And for some crazy reason, I became
absolutely certain that it had been Ali’s right
leg-his twisted polio leg- that had finally
betrayed him and stepped on that land
mine.” (Hosseini 217).
“My vision started going by the late 1980’s,
so I had Hassan read me your mother’s
books.” (Hosseini 220).
“They were catching up on all the lost years, Why did Hassan’s mother decide to come
Gerbec 3
Author’s use of a rhetorical question; asking
us to recall whether or not we remember
him mentioning the melon vendors in
Afghanistan. This is used to make the
readers take a step back and think about the
last time he mentioned this. Did something
important happen here that readers might
need to remember? Or was this simply the
narrator’s way of reminiscing the old days at
the vendors?
Beginning in chapter sixteen, the narrator
switches from Amir- who was the narrator
for the whole book thus far- to Rahim Kahn.
It’s interesting to see why the author did
this. Maybe he wanted to dedicate a chapter
to emphasize the fact that Amir had been
gone all those years, abandoning Hassan, his
house, and Afghanistan as a whole. Or did
the author do this to make the story more
interesting by changing the perspective and
allowing us to see once and for all that
maybe Amir wasn’t the most reliable
source?
Why did Rahim Khan think it was Ali’s
polio leg that betrayed him and stepped on
the land mine? Was this foreshadowing
something else to come? Or was this just a
“crazy reason” Rahim came up with to
satisfy himself? Was Ali’s deformed leg
really a curse so much as to kill him? Does
this reflect how his leg had led to bullying
and harassment his entire life?
Interesting to see how the roles flipped in a
sense. Amir used to read Hassan his
mothers’ books because Hassan couldn’t do
so himself, and now, Hassan was reading
Rahim Khan Amir’s mothers’ books. Was
this foreshadowing the reconnection
between Amir and Hassan? Or was this
Hassan’s way of returning the favour to
Amir by reading to his fathers’ friends?

I suppose.” (Hosseini 222).
“Hearing Rahim Khan speak Ali’s name
was like finding an old dusty music box that
hadn’t been opened in years;...” (Hosseini
226).
“She had a large purple bruise on her leg for
days but what could I do except stand and
watch my wife get beaten? If I fought, that
dog would have surely put a bullet in me,
and gladly!” (Hosseini 228).
Gerbec 4
back now, after all these years? Why didn’t
Hassan ask for an explanation as to why she
left? Wouldn’t a mother and son
reconnecting after so many years be
interested in knowing what happened, why
she left, what she had been doing all those
years without him? Or why she even left in
the first place? Will we ever know? Or will
that be an unanswered question in this book?
Use of literary device; simile. Author
compares hearing Ali’s name after all those
years to opening an old dusty music box.
Maybe Amir was realizing how much he
missed Ali, how hearing his name brought
up so many good memories he had with
him.
This brings up a lot of ideas and questions
for me. For one, Hassan’s experience with
his wife getting beaten reminds me of when
Hassan was being sexually harassed by
Assef. If Amir had stood up to Assef, he
would have been beaten and perhaps raped
as well, just like if Hassan stood up for his
wife, he would've been shot. Does this bring
some sort of closure to Amir, since Hassan
was in a similar predicament as Amir was
and did the same thing Amir did? Is this
Hassan’s way of telling Amir implicitly, that
he understood why Amir didn’t help him
that day?