The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini: 5-Minute Cram Summary
The novel opens in 2001 with the adult Amir receiving a phone call from Rahim Khan in Pakistan, who tells him "There is a way to be good again." Amir immediately thinks back to the winter of 1975 in Kabul — the day everything changed.
In Kabul in the early 1970s, Amir and Hassan grow up together on Baba's estate. Amir is the privileged Pashtun son; Hassan is the Hazara servant boy, son of Ali. They are inseparable as children — reading together under a pomegranate tree, watching movies, flying kites. Hassan is illiterate but quick and perceptive. He is also the best kite runner in Kabul: when a kite is cut, Hassan always knows exactly where it will land, as if by instinct.
Amir craves his powerful father Baba's love and approval, but feels Baba is closer to Hassan in temperament — both are physically brave where Amir is timid. Baba once told Rahim Khan: "A boy who won't stand up for himself becomes a man who can't stand up for anything." Amir hears this and understands it as a verdict on himself.
The neighborhood bully is Assef — half-German, half-Afghan, with pale blue eyes. He openly idolizes Adolf Hitler and expresses contempt for Hazaras. He threatens Amir and Hassan with brass knuckles but backs off only because Hassan points his slingshot directly at his eye. Assef warns them: "This isn't the end."
In the winter of 1975, Amir enters Kabul's annual kite-fighting tournament. His plan: win the tournament and bring Baba the last cut kite as a trophy — the ultimate proof of worth. Hassan will run the kite for him. They make a perfect team and Amir's blue kite defeats all others, cutting the last opponent's string. He has won.
Hassan runs the losing kite — the prize — and disappears around a corner. When Amir goes looking, he finds Hassan in a dead-end alley, cornered by Assef and two other boys. Assef demands the kite. Hassan refuses — it belongs to Amir. Assef rapes Hassan while the other boys hold him. Amir watches from the alley entrance and does nothing. He tells himself he could run, could get help — but he does not. He turns and walks away.
Hassan returns with the kite, blood on his trousers, and says nothing. Amir says nothing. He takes the kite and runs home to Baba, who is proud of him. That night Amir cannot look at Hassan.
Amir cannot bear his own guilt. He begins avoiding Hassan. He provokes Hassan by throwing pomegranates at him, demanding Hassan fight back. Hassan does not — he picks up a pomegranate and smashes it against his own forehead instead. Amir is disgusted with himself but cannot stop.
On his birthday, Amir receives many gifts. He slips his new watch and some bills under Hassan's mattress and tells Baba that Hassan stole them. Baba calls Hassan in. Hassan — knowing what Amir has done — confesses to the theft he did not commit. This is his final act of loyalty to Amir: he takes the blame.
Baba forgives Hassan immediately, stunning Amir. But Ali tells Baba they must leave — he and Hassan cannot stay in the household. Despite Baba's tearful pleading, Ali is firm. He and Hassan leave. Amir watches from the window as the car pulls away. He never sees Hassan again for decades.
In 1979, the Soviet Union invades Afghanistan. By 1981, Kabul is under occupation. Baba and Amir flee — hidden in the fuel tank of a truck with other refugees, then on foot over the mountains to Pakistan. Baba stands up to a Soviet soldier who demands to assault a refugee woman, risking his life. In Kabul he was powerful; in America he is nobody.
They settle in Fremont, California. Baba works at a gas station. Amir attends high school and then college — he studies English and wants to be a writer. Baba is proud of Amir for the first time in a genuine, uncomplicated way. They sell goods at the San Jose flea market on weekends, where the Afghan immigrant community gathers.
At the flea market, Amir falls in love with Soraya Taheri, the daughter of a former Afghan general. They court in the traditional Afghan way, through family visits. Before their engagement, Soraya honestly tells Amir that she once ran away from home with a man — her family's shame. Amir, carrying his own far heavier secret, tells her it does not matter.
Baba is diagnosed with terminal lung cancer — inoperable. He is too proud to take chemotherapy. He lives long enough to arrange Amir and Soraya's wedding. It is the happiest day of Amir's life and also the last good day of Baba's. Baba dies in his sleep the night after the wedding. Amir publishes his first novel. He and Soraya discover they cannot have children — infertility with no medical explanation. Amir carries the private thought that this is his punishment.
In 2001, Amir receives the phone call from Rahim Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan. He flies to meet him. Rahim Khan is dying. He tells Amir what happened to Hassan: after Baba and Amir fled, Hassan and his wife Farzana came to Kabul to care for Baba's empty house. They had a son named Sohrab. When the Taliban took Kabul in 1996, they went door to door. They came to Baba's house and shot Hassan and Farzana in the street — accused of being squatters. Sohrab was taken to an orphanage.
Then Rahim Khan reveals the truth: Hassan was Baba's son — Amir's half-brother. Baba had an affair with Ali's wife. He never acknowledged Hassan publicly because it would have been the greatest possible shame in Afghan society — a betrayal of Ali, his closest friend. Rahim Khan asks Amir to go to Kabul and bring Sohrab — Hassan's son, his nephew — out of Afghanistan and to safety.
Amir travels to Kabul with a driver named Farid. The city he knew is gone — buildings bombed, people in burqas, Taliban soldiers with Kalashnikovs on every corner. Music is forbidden. Kite flying is forbidden. Women cannot leave the house without a male escort.
At a soccer stadium, Amir witnesses a Taliban public execution — a man and woman buried to their waist and stoned to death at halftime as the crowd watches. The Taliban official overseeing the execution is dressed in white sunglasses. Farid arranges a meeting.
The Taliban official is Assef. He is keeping Sohrab as a personal servant and — it is made clear — sex slave. He has the boy dance for him in bells and makeup. Amir tells Assef he has come for Sohrab. Assef agrees to let Sohrab go — on one condition: Amir must fight him first, just the two of them.
Assef beats Amir with brass knuckles — breaking ribs, shattering his jaw, rupturing his spleen. Amir begins to laugh during the beating. He later understands why: he is being punished at last for what he did to Hassan. The beating feels like relief. He stops fighting back.
As Assef prepares to deliver a finishing blow, Sohrab — watching from across the room — loads his slingshot with a steel ball. He warns Assef to stop. Assef laughs. Sohrab shoots the ball directly into Assef's left eye. Assef screams and clutches his face. Amir and Sohrab run. They escape with Farid's help.
Amir is hospitalized in Pakistan. He learns he has the same cleft lip that Hassan had — his jaw was broken and repaired, leaving a scar. For the first time he carries a physical mark that connects him to Hassan. During his recovery, Sohrab asks Amir if he will have to go back to an orphanage. Amir says no — he wants to take him to America. Sohrab, cautiously, begins to trust him.
The American adoption process hits a bureaucratic wall — an official tells Amir it may be impossible without proof of Sohrab's parents' deaths. Amir, panicking, makes a terrible mistake: he tells Sohrab it may be necessary to put him in a Pakistani orphanage temporarily while the paperwork is sorted. Sohrab — who was abused in an Afghan orphanage and then by Assef — is devastated. He has already told Amir he would rather die than go back.
Amir finds Sohrab in the bathtub with slit wrists. He is rushed to the hospital and survives, but something has broken in him. He becomes almost completely silent and withdrawn. He comes to America with Amir and Soraya, but barely speaks or responds for months. He has closed himself off entirely.
The novel ends in Fremont, California, in the winter of 2002. There is an Afghan community gathering with kite flying. Sohrab has shown no emotion for months. Amir buys two kites and offers one to Sohrab. He begins to fly it alongside the boy. Without a word, Sohrab takes the string. When Amir performs the classic kite-fighting move his father taught him, he cuts an opponent's kite. He looks at Sohrab — and sees, for just a moment, the ghost of a smile on the boy's face.
Amir offers to run the cut kite for Sohrab — echoing Hassan's words: "For you, a thousand times over." He runs. The novel ends.
Quoted works:
· The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. New York: Riverhead Books, 2003. Short quotations used for educational commentary under fair use.
This page is a study aid for students. All quotations are clearly attributed to their original sources. For a richer and fuller experience, we encourage you to read the original book.
Comments
Post a Comment