Redemption In The Kite Runner

Fitiwi Tsigeyohannes
Miss Tapper
May 11, 2014
ENG3UI
Journey to Redemption It is said, “at the cross God wrapped his heart in flesh and blood and let it be nailed t the cross for our redemption”(E. Stanley Jones). In Khaled Hosseini’s book The Kite Runner 2003, revolves around the fact that sin can transform into redemption. The novel starts by Amir foretelling us about his ultimate sin in that winter of 1975 when Hassan gets raped and Amir chose to do nothing. And he tells the reader he carried that guilt even in America, “... Looking back now, I realized I have been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years.” (Hosseini 1) As Amir retells the story of his life, he weighs each event against his sin, his betrayal of Hassan.
When Amir saw Hassan getting raped, he felt like he had to be sacrificed like the lamb, “He moved his head slightly and I caught a glimpse of his face. Saw the resignation in it. It was a look I had seen before. It was the look of the lamb” (Hosseini 81). Amir also throws pomegranate at Hassan hoping that Hassan will hit him back, so his guilt can disappear. Instead, Hassan takes the pomegranate from Amir’s hand and smashes at his own head. When Amir’s plan did not fall through he decided to put the watch and money he received from his birthday under Hassan’s mattress. This caused Hassan and Ali to move out as well as caused Baba to cry and beg them to stay. Years after Amir moved to America, Rahim Khan called Amir and let him know there is a way to be good again. When Amir flew to Pakistan, Rahim Khan tells him that Hassan is his half-brother. During the years Amir and Hassan were separated, Hassan had started his own family and had boy named Sorhab. Amir feels like he has betrayed his own brother and had to redeem himself, he had to go to Kabul to get Sorhab. In order to get Sorhab Amir had to go through Assef. To get through Assef, Amir had to fight him. Assef lets the guards know that the winner of this fight would walk out free. Assef pulls out his brass knuckles and starts beating Amir, almost killing him. Ribs are being crushed. This is because after a long wait he finally tasted
Rahim Khan reveals to Amir that Ali was sterile, and that Baba fathered Hassan with Sanaubar. Amir starts to see why Sanaubar really left. Although the author does not tells us why Sanaubar left, we start to get ideas on why she left, maybe she left because if she stayed Ali would have known he was sterile and there would have been a big fight between Baba and Ali. When Sanaubar finally came back to redeem herself, Ali is dead and Hassan is married, “We lay her on the sofa and took off her burqa. Beneath it, we found a toothless women with stringy graying hair and sores on her arms. She looked like she had not eaten for days. But the worst of it by far was her face. Someone had taken a knife to it and… Amir jan, the slashes cut this was and that way. One of the cuts went from cheeckbone to hairline and it had not spared her left eye on the way. It was grotesque,” (Hosseini 221). When Sanaubar reveals to Hassan that she is his mother, he gets so furious that he runs up the hill where Hassan and Amir used to play. When Hassan finally comes back the next morning he forgives his mother and tells her that she was home now. To redeem herself Sanaubar picked tomatoes, trim the rosebushes, and talked with Hassan, catching up on all of those lost years. When Sorhab was born, he became the center of her existence, she sewed clothes for him, built him toys from scrap of wood, rags and dried grass. When he was sick, she was