The Kite Runner Chapter 11 Quotes
How we cite the quotes:
Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote 1
Lying awake in bed that night, I thought of Soraya Taheri's sickle-shaped birthmark, her gently hooked nose, and the way her luminous eyes had fleetingly held mine. My heart stuttered at the thought of her. (11.104)
Soraya doesn't sound that hot here. From Hosseini's description, we picture the witch in "Sleeping Beauty": her nose is hooked like a scythe, and her eyes are glowing in a potion-induced mania. However, we do think Soraya's sickle-shaped birthmark should remind you of someone else in the book. Give up? That's right: Hassan. (Hassan has a harelip.) Why do you think Hosseini compare these two characters through their physical features? What else do they have in common?
Quote 2
The same day he was hired, Baba and I went to our eligibility officer in San Jose, Mrs. Dobbins. She was an overweight black woman with twinkling eyes and a dimpled smile. She'd told me once that she sang in church, and I believed her – she had a voice that made me think of warm milk and honey. Baba dropped the stack of food stamps on her desk. "Thank you but I don't want," Baba said. "I work always. In Afghanistan I work, in America I work. Thank you very much, Mrs. Dobbins, but I don't like it free money."
Mrs. Dobbins blinked. Picked up the food stamps, looked from me to Baba like we were pulling a prank, or "slipping her a trick" as Hassan used to say. "Fifteen years I been doin' this job and nobody's ever done this," she said. And that was how Baba ended those humiliating food stamp moments at the cash register and alleviated one of his greatest fears: that an Afghan would see him buying food with charity money. Baba walked out of the welfare office like a man cured of a tumor. (11.29-30)
Even in America, where Amir finally sees a more human side of Baba since they struggle to make ends meet, Baba never wavers in his principles. One of which, it seems, is to not be on welfare. This probably comes from Baba's strong sense of independence and self-sufficiency. This episode with the welfare eligibility officer makes Rahim Khan's revelation of Baba's affair with Sanaubar all the more surprising. Baba seems ready to sacrifice his comfort (here) and even his life (with the Russian soldier above) for the principle of honor (nang). So, how could Baba betray Ali? And how could Baba literally live with his betrayal (since he keeps Hassan around)?
Quote 3
Baba would enlighten me with his politics during those walks with long-winded dissertations. "There are only three real men in this world, Amir," he'd say. He'd count them off on his fingers: America the brash savior, Britain, and Israel. "The rest of them – " he used to wave his hand and make a phht sound " – they're like gossiping old women."
[...]. In Baba's view, Israel was an island of "real men" in a sea of Arabs too busy getting fat off their oil to care for their own. "Israel does this, Israel does that," Baba would say in a mock-Arabic accent. "Then do something about it! Take action. You're Arabs, help the Palestinians, then!" (11.3-4)
Baba's ideas about masculinity even seep into his politics. America, Britain, and Israel are the only real men in international politics because they take action instead of simply talk. Don't forget, though, how Baba's life changes once he immigrates to America, one of the "masculine" countries. He diminishes in stature; he's no longer throwing lavish parties and building orphanages, but instead working long hours at a gas station. And what caused Baba to move to America? The Soviet Union invades Afghanistan, which sounds like a country "taking action." The very qualities – and countries – Baba praises actually ruin him. Is it possible for Hosseini to include any more irony in this novel?
Quote 4
What America and the world needed was a hard man. A man to be reckoned with, someone who took action instead of wringing his hands. That someone came in the form of Ronald Reagan. And when Reagan went on TV and called the Shorawi "the Evil Empire," Baba went out and bought a picture of the grinning president giving a thumbs up. He framed the picture and hung it in our hallway, nailing it right next to the old black-and-white of himself in his thin necktie shaking hands with King Zahir Shah. (11.5)
It's really no surprise Baba would love Ronald Regan. First off, Regan lets the Soviet Union have it. This should please any Afghan who lived through the Shorawi invasion of 1979. But another aspect of Regan might attract Baba. Regan, as a politician, drew on the American mythology of the West, the gunslinger who sets things right. In his dress and demeanor, Regan reminded Americans of John Wayne, the iconic star of the Western film. Reagan was even in a few Westerns during his acting career. With Baba and Amir's diet of American movies in mind (action flicks, Westerns), Regan must seem like the shining god of masculinity and honor.
Quote 5
Just one month after we arrived in the U.S., Baba found a job off Washington Boulevard as an assistant at a gas station owned by an Afghan acquaintance – he'd started looking for work the same week we arrived. Six days a week, Baba pulled twelve-hour shifts pumping gas, running the register, changing oil, and washing windshields. I'd bring him lunch sometimes and find him looking for a pack of cigarettes on the shelves, a customer waiting on the other side of the oil-stained counter, Baba's face drawn and pale under the bright fluorescent lights. The electronic bell over the door would ding-dong when I walked in, and Baba would look over his shoulder, wave, and smile, his eyes watering from fatigue. (11.28)
This Baba certainly isn't the bear-wrestling, pipe-smoking legend of the first third of the novel. Baba works long hours at a gas station, serving customers, tied to the scourge of all retail salespersons: the electronic bell. Do you think Amir still admires Baba – or has Baba's stature significantly diminished in Amir's eyes? We admire Baba's work ethic and determination. But we also think the magic aura surrounding Baba has disappeared. He seems normal now. He's no longer the all-powerful father driving a Ford Mustang from Bullitt. In fact, now he's working at a filling station pumping gas into other people's cars.
Quote 6
That summer of 1983, I graduated from high school at the age of twenty, by far the oldest senior tossing his mortarboard on the football field that day. I remember losing Baba in the swarm of families, flashing cameras, and blue gowns. I found him near the twenty-yard line, hands shoved in his pockets, camera dangling on his chest. He disappeared and reappeared behind the people moving between us: squealing blue-clad girls hugging, crying, boys high-fiving their fathers, each other. Baba's beard was graying, his hair thinning at the temples, and hadn't he been taller in Kabul? He was wearing his brown suit – his only suit, the same one he wore to Afghan weddings and funerals – and the red tie I had bought for his fiftieth birthday that year. Then he saw me and waved. Smiled. He motioned for me to wear my mortarboard, and took a picture of me with the school's clock tower in the background. I smiled for him – in a way, this was his day more than mine. He walked to me, curled his arm around my neck, and gave my brow a single kiss. "I am moftakhir, Amir," he said. Proud. His eyes gleamed when he said that and I liked being on the receiving end of that look. (11.31)
Does the immigration to America reverse Baba and Amir's roles? Certainly, Amir has an easier time adapting to their new country. And Baba's once-imposing stature diminishes as he works long hours at a low-paying job. The last time we saw Baba proud of Amir, Amir had just won the kite tournament. Baba's admiration for Amir, in that case, lasted only a short time. We suspect, however, that things change permanently at this point. Baba waits around to take a picture of Amir, lost in the crowd. Even more significant is the fact that Amir "liked being on the receiving end of that look." This isn't the longing Amir once had for his father's admiration.
"I think I'll major in English," I said. I winced inside, waiting for his reply.
[Baba:] "English?"
[Amir:] "Creative writing."
He considered this. Sipped his tea. "Stories, you mean. You'll make up stories." I looked down at my feet.
[Baba:] "They pay for that, making up stories?"
[Amir:] "If you're good," I said. "And if you get discovered."
[Baba:] "How likely is that, getting discovered?"
"It happens," I said.
He nodded. "And what will you do while you wait to get good and get discovered? How will you earn money? If you marry, how will you support your khanum?"
I couldn't lift my eyes to meet his. "I'll...find a job."
"Oh," he said. "Wah wah! So, if I understand, you'll study several years to earn a degree, then you'll get a chatti job like mine, one you could just as easily land today, on the small chance that your degree might someday help you get...discovered." He took a deep breath and sipped his tea. Grunted something about medical school, law school, and "real work." (11.47-57)
Amir has to be discouraged by Baba's response here. Majoring in Creative Writing – as Baba points out – won't land Amir a job and will likely force Amir to take a job he would qualify for now. Amir also won't be able to support a family with writing. All that sounds glum. But none of it compares, we think, with the proverbial drop-kick to the stomach Baba bestows on writing. "Stories, you mean. You'll make up stories." What is writing according to Baba? Fabrication. Writing sounds so silly when Baba says it that way. Is Baba's definition of writing reductive or is it clear-sighted? What is Baba missing about Amir's love for writing? Is he even been aware of Amir's love for writing?
"Amir is going to be a great writer," Baba said. I did a double take at this. "He has finished his first year of college and earned A's in all of his courses."
"Junior college," I corrected him.
"Mashallah," General Taheri said. "Will you be writing about our country, history perhaps? Economics?"
"I write fiction," I said, thinking of the dozen or so short stories I had written in the leather-bound notebook Rahim Khan had given me, wondering why I was suddenly embarrassed by them in this man's presence.
"Ah, a storyteller," the general said. "Well, people need stories to divert them at difficult times like this." (11.78-82)
The General intends to slam writing here as if he's a WWF wrestler and writing is a competitor who just insulted his mother. The General dismisses fiction as mere storytelling. As a diversion for people during "difficult times." How accurate is the General's comments? Does Amir write for diversion in "difficult times"? Do you think Amir feels guilty because he's not writing about Afghan history? Does The Kite Runner itself fulfill the General's requirements for serious writing? Or would the General call it mere storytelling?
One day, I came home from the pharmacy with Baba's morphine pills. Just as I shut the door, I caught a glimpse of Soraya quickly sliding something under Baba's blanket. "Hey, I saw that! What were you two doing?" I said.
"Nothing," Soraya said, smiling.
"Liar." I lifted Baba's blanket. "What's this?" I said, though as soon as I picked up the leather-bound book, I knew. I traced my fingers along the gold-stitched borders. I remembered the fireworks the night Rahim Khan had given it to me, the night of my thirteenth birthday, flares sizzling and exploding into bouquets of red, green, and yellow.
"I can't believe you can write like this," Soraya said.
Baba dragged his head off the pillow. "I put her up to it. I hope you don't mind."
I gave the notebook back to Soraya and left the room. Baba hated it when I cried. (11.36-41)
Baba finally hears Amir's stories after all these years. It's enough to move Amir to tears and enough to make us sniffle a little too. Hosseini also cleverly inserts a description of what good writing might be like: "Rahim Khan had given it to me, the night of my thirteenth birthday, flares sizzling and exploding into bouquets of red, green, and yellow." Doesn't fiction seem like that sometimes? The plot pauses and the prose bursts into a lyrical moment of ridiculous beauty.