How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
With me as the glaring exception, my father molded the world around him to his liking. The problem, of course, was that Baba saw the world in black and white. And he got to decide what was black and what was white. You can't love a person who lives that way without fearing him too. Maybe even hating him a little. (3.12)
A later description reads: "[...] Baba had been such an unusual Afghan father, a liberal who had lived by his own rules, a maverick who had disregarded or embraced societal customs as he had seen fit" (13.97). Is Amir even describing the same person – can someone both see the world in black and white and be a liberal maverick? At first, Baba might seem just like Amir's teacher, Mullah Fatiullah Khan, whom Baba criticizes for being self-righteous and stodgy. Don't those adjectives describe someone with a black and white approach? The difference, however, is that Baba chooses his principles. ("[A] maverick who had disregarded or embraced societal customs as he had seen fit.") Which makes the character of Baba both a freethinker and an old-fashioned moralist. It's enough to make Amir's head spin.
Quote #2
"Good," Baba said, but his eyes wondered. "Now, no matter what the mullah teaches, there is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft. Do you understand that?"
"No, Baba jan," I said, desperately wishing I did. I didn't want to disappoint him again. [...]
"When you kill a man, you steal a life," Baba said. "You steal his wife's right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness. Do you see?" [...]
"There is no act more wretched than stealing, Amir," Baba said. "A man who takes what's not his to take, be it a life or a loaf of naan...I spit on such a man. And if I ever cross paths with him, God help him. Do you understand?" (3.29-34)
As Amir tells us about his father, a portrait of an immensely likable, dominant, and moral man emerges. To Amir, Baba is both larger-than-life and principled. The combination of these two qualities magnifies Amir's shame when he abandons Hassan in the alleyway. How could you ever tell a man who supposedly wrestled a bear that you broke one of his principles? That you allowed Assef to steal Hassan's innocence and childhood? Of course, all this is complicated by the fact that Baba – before Amir was born – stole Ali's honor. With that in mind, Baba's bit of advice to Amir contains a good deal of self-loathing.
Quote #3
I heard the leather of Baba's seat creaking as he shifted on it. I closed my eyes, pressed my ear even harder against the door, wanting to hear, not wanting to hear. [Baba:] "Sometimes I look out this window and I see him playing on the street with the neighborhood boys. I see how they push him around, take his toys from him, give him a shove here, a whack there. And, you know, he never fights back. Never. He just...drops his head and..."
"So he's not violent," Rahim Khan said.
"That's not what I mean, Rahim, and you know it," Baba shot back. "There is something missing in that boy."
[Rahim Khan:] "Yes, a mean streak."
[Baba:] "Self-defense has nothing to do with meanness. You know what always happens when the neighborhood boys tease him? Hassan steps in and fends them off. I've seen it with my own eyes. And when they come home, I say to him, 'How did Hassan get that scrape on his face?' And he says, 'He fell down.' I'm telling you, Rahim, there is something missing in that boy."
"You just need to let him find his way," Rahim Khan said.
"And where is he headed?" Baba said. "A boy who won't stand up for himself becomes a man who can't stand up to anything." (3.60-66)
Hosseini, you and your irony. Baba complains to Rahim Khan about Amir. According to Baba, Amir never stands up for himself; he always lets Hassan defend him. And someone who can't stand up for himself can't stand up for a friend, or his principles, or anything. Amir overhears Baba's little speech and it hurts him deeply. But the irony comes into focus later when Amir watches Assef rape Hassan and doesn't intervene. So Amir secretly listens to his father criticize the betrayal he will later secretly commit. Irony and foreshadowing at the same time. It's like a party or something.
Quote #4
That was when Baba stood up. It was my turn to clamp a hand on his thigh, but Baba pried it loose, snatched his leg away. When he stood, he eclipsed the moonlight. "I want you to ask this man something," Baba said. He said it to Karim, but looked directly at the Russian officer. "Ask him where his shame is."
They spoke. "He says this is war. There is no shame in war."
"Tell him he's wrong. War doesn't negate decency. It demands it, even more than in times of peace." (10.18-20)
Well, when a man eclipses the moonlight, you should listen. Notice how Amir doesn't listen, though. An Afghan woman is about to be raped and Amir tries to stop Baba from standing up to the Russian officer. Remind you of something Amir does (or doesn't do) in an earlier chapter? Baba's actions, honorable as they are, must compound Amir's guilt. His father does exactly what Amir failed to do. Amir even tries to stop his father – as if some unconscious part of him wants his father, and the others in the truck, to share his guilt instead of magnifying it.
Quote #5
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 #6
[Soraya:] "I heard you write."
How did she know? I wondered if her father had told her, maybe she had asked him. I immediately dismissed both scenarios as absurd. Fathers and sons could talk freely about women. But no Afghan girl – no decent and mohtaram Afghan girl, at least – queried her father about a young man. And no father, especially a Pashtun with nang and namoos, would discuss a mojarad with his daughter, not unless the fellow in question was a khastegar, a suitor, who had done the honorable thing and sent his father to knock on the door. (12.40-41)
OK, so you probably need some translations here. Mohtaram means "respected." A mojarad is a single man. Nang and namoos mean "honor" and "pride," respectively. And, though you can probably figure this one out, a khastegar is a suitor.
Now we can get down to business. The Kite Runner is obsessed with the practice of one's principles. We think you can divide the book's principles into two categories: ethical principles and traditional principles. "You shouldn't betray your best friend (and half-brother)" is an ethical principle. "Afghan girls shouldn't talk with their fathers about datable single men" would be a traditional principle. We can all agree with the ethical principles in the book, but the traditional principles espoused by characters like Baba and the General sometimes seem slightly sexist or racist. Part of Amir's difficulty in the book is that he has to navigate between ethical principles and traditional principles. These two come into conflict more than you might think. Consider, for example, the complexities of ethnicity in the book. An ethical principle might be to love your half-brother. A traditional principle might be – according to Assef and the General and lots of Pashtuns – to treat Hazaras as inferiors. It's got to be quite confusing for Amir at times.
Quote #7
[Soraya:] "Their sons go out to nightclubs looking for meat and get their girlfriends pregnant, they have kids out of wedlock and no one says a goddamn thing. Oh, they're just men having fun! I make one mistake and suddenly everyone is talking nang and namoos, and I have to have my face rubbed in it for the rest of my life." (13.86)
Soraya slams Afghan culture for its double-standard with men and women. Men can go out to the club and have sex; women can't even have sex with a long-term boyfriend. We would also like to point out that Baba has a double-standard. He criticizes Amir for not standing up to the neighborhood boys. Well, how did Hassan get into this world? Baba had an affair with Ali's wife. That doesn't really count as standing up for your friend.
Quote #8
"I didn't tell you," Soraya said, dabbing at her eyes, "but my father showed up with a gun that night. He told...him...that he had two bullets in the chamber, one for him and one for himself if I didn't come home. I was screaming, calling my father all kinds of names, saying he couldn't keep me locked up forever, that I wished he were dead." Fresh tears squeezed out between her lids. "I actually said that to him, that I wished he were dead." (13.88)
Wow. General Taheri shows up one night to his daughter's apartment because she's been living with an Afghan man. We guess it's obvious from this passage how important honor is to General Taheri. He's willing to kill both himself and Soraya's boyfriend to save not only her honor but his own.
Quote #9
"You know," Rahim Khan said, "one time, when you weren't around, your father and I were talking. And you know how he always worried about you in those days. I remember he said to me, 'Rahim, a boy who won't stand up for himself becomes a man who can't stand up to anything.' I wonder, is that what you've become?" (17.34)
Rahim Khan has just asked Amir to rescue Sohrab from Kabul. Amir is initially resistant, so Rahim Khan tries three times to convince Amir to undertake the task. (The task is obviously a redemptive quest because there's no reason Amir has to rescue Sohrab. Rahim Khan tells Amir he has enough money to get Sohrab, so it seems like anyone could have performed this task.) Anyway, Rahim Khan gives Amir three reasons why he should rescue Sohrab. One, because your father thought you couldn't stand up for anything and here's your chance to prove him wrong. Second, it's my dying wish that you rescue Sohrab. And third, Hassan was actually your half-brother, so you owe it to him. We think all these reasons add up and Amir agrees to rescue Sohrab. Of course, the third reason seals the deal, but they're all important and end up motivating Amir.
Quote #10
How could he have lied to me all those years? To Hassan? He had sat me on his lap when I was little, looked me straight in the eyes, and said, There is only one sin. And that is theft... When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. Hadn't he said those words to me? And now, fifteen years after I'd buried him, I was learning that Baba had been a thief. And a thief of the worst kind, because the things he'd stolen had been sacred: from me the right to know I had a brother, from Hassan his identity, and from Ali his honor. His nang. His namoos. (18.5)
This is a central moment in the novel because it revises our picture of Baba, and thus our picture of Amir. Amir's guilt, all these years, has partly resulted from Baba's very strict adherence to a personal code. Baba's set of principles include honor (nang), pride (namoos), and loyalty. Now Amir finds out the following: not only did Baba "steal" Ali's honor and pride, but he stole a sense of self from Hassan, and a brother from Amir. What are you supposed to do when you find out the single most important figure of authority and morality in your life strayed from his principles? That's right, go on a personal quest of redemption to rescue your half-nephew from a sadistic, Mein Kampf-toting member of the Taliban.