May 3rd, 2019
Partner: Kshef Kamran
Writer: Khaled Hosseini
Novel of Focus: A Thousand Splendid Suns
Which genres has the writer written in professionally? Which genre is most noteworthy/recognized with the writer?
- To date, Hosseini has written three major novels: The Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns, and And The Mountains Echoed.
- The genre that he has written in is fiction, however, it contains many issues of history, injustice in many aspects of life,living in a war infested country, and family politics
- Being settled in the United States, happily married, and ready to start a family did not make Hosseini forget his roots.
- Recalling his early upbringing in the capital of Kabul where the women and men were equal, he remembered it as cultivated and civilized. He longed to share a story that described these prior successes of his country before the Taliban seized control and seemed to destroy all of it.
What biographical information about the writer is relevant to their writing?
- Born in 1965 in the capital city of Kabul, he lived there until 1976 when his father’s employer, the Afghan Foreign Ministry, relocated the family to Paris, France.
- In 1980, after the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, Hosseini’s father applied for political asylum in the United States and the family relocated to San Jose, California.
- After 11 years in Afghanistan and four years in Paris, 15 year old Khaled was in America for the first time.
- Speaking virtually no English, there were many adjustments to come for Khaled, not only in terms of the language and cultural barriers, but the major shift of being in an affluent family to living off of welfare with other Afghan refugees.
- Being the oldest of his siblings, he was determined to be successful and worked hard to understand the language.
- Deeply inspired by The Grapes of Wrath, his first book in English, he began writing stories of his own in English. After high school he headed to Santa Clara College to study biology, which, after graduating in 1988, set him up perfectly for his next step of attending the University of California’s School of Medicine where he earned his medical degree.
- Moving on to a medical internship in 1996, he was well on his way to becoming a doctor.
- In 2001, he began his first book, The Kite Runner by writing every morning at 4 a.m. before seeing his daily patients. Eventually, he decided to give up practicing medicine in order to continue writing and pursue his passion of working with the United Nations to help support refugees.
Who/what has been the greatest influences on the writer?
Having an Afghani background, Hosseini generally writes his tales from the perspective of prewar, wartime, and postwar Afghanis. For his novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, Hosseini visited Afghanistan and spoke to women with experiences that inspired the characters of Mariam Jo and Laila. “I was speaking to them [the women] just to learn about what had happened in my country … [the main character in the novel] were based on the collective spirit of all the women that I met in Kabul in the spring.” He was also raised in a rich lifestyle before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and was encouraged to write as young as 7 years old.
Video that includes the writer’s influence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4kyalTT_wY
What stylistic techniques is the writer known for?
- The writing style of Khaled Hosseini in A Thousand Splendid Suns is both sympathetic and disgusted. He feels pity on those that bear the burden of the war. He shows this mostly through the use of two major literary devices: Symbolism and Imagery.
- These two literary devices impact the reader because it gives a deeper insight and understanding of the pain and fear these characters were forced into dealing with every day.
- An example of how Hosseini feels disgusted and sympathetic is when one of the main characters, Mariam Jo, is forced to go live with her father after her mother’s untimely death on page 36, “suddenly he was standing in front of her, trying to cover her eyes, pushing her back the way they had come saying ‘Go back!
What themes is the writer known for?
Hosseini illustrates a wide variety of themes in each of his books. Generally, he uses the same ones repeatedly, so each book has its own plot, while reflecting his distinctive style. It gives the reader a, ‘THIS is definitely a Khaled Hosseini style of book. He highlights:
- Love and Relationships
Talk about finding love in a hopeless place. The characters of A Thousand Splendid Suns are wounded in wars, stuck in abusive relationships, and rejected by their families. They have to struggle every day to survive. How do they get through it? It’s simple
- Betrayal
- Hatred
- Warfare
A Thousand Splendid Suns is defined by war, but that doesn’t mean it has to like it. The novel does not shy from showing you the horrible reality of war and its effect on regular people, but it’s not a hopeless tale. Instead, it’s concerned with how people manage to endure despite the horrors that surround them. War is tough, sure, but people are tougher.
- Hierarchy of social class/gender patriarchy
If there’s one subject that A Thousand Splendid Suns focuses on, it’s the nature of women. Laila and Mariam live through a rough period for women’s rights in Afghanistan. They’re controlled by the government, treated as property by their husbands, and forbidden from taking part in society. Yet, through their strength and resilience, the two women are able to overcome these obstacles. It might not always be pretty, but that’s the point. The women in the novel aren’t like Princess Peach waiting for their Mario—they’re incredibly tough women trying to take control of their own lives.
- Injustice
- Family
Nobody loves his or her family all of the time. That’s just a fact of life. Despite this, A Thousand Splendid Suns suggests that there’s no one more important than your family. The novel also suggests that the concept of “family” extends beyond blood relatives. Think about how Mariam and Laila develop a mother-daughter relationship, or think about the bond between Tariq and Zalmai that begins to grow at the end of the novel. Sometimes family is your blood, and sometimes it isn’t—but your family, however you define it, is always at the center of your life.
What advice does the writer have for us as writers?
“Even my finished books are approximations of what I intended to do. I try to narrow the gap, as much as I possibly can, between what I wanted to say and what’s actually on the page. But there’s still a gap, there always is. It’s very, very difficult…But that’s what art is for—for both reader and writer to overcome their respective limitations and encounter something true. It seems miraculous, doesn’t it? That somebody can articulate something clearly and beautifully that exists inside you…Great art reaches through the fog, towards this secret heart—and it shows it to you, holds it before you. It’s a revelatory, incredibly moving experience when this happens. You feel understood. You feel heard. That’s why we come to art—we feel less alone. We are less alone.”
Video that includes advice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oWstZMSMVo
Quote
Analyzing this quote
I.)“Mariam lay on the couch, hands tucked between her knees, watched the whirlpool of snow twisting and spinning outside the window. She remembered Nana saying once that each snowflake was a sigh heaved by an aggrieved woman somewhere in the world. That all the sighs drifted up the sky, gathered into clouds, then broke into tiny pieces that fell silently on the people below. As a reminder of how people like us suffer, she’d said. How quietly we endure all that falls upon us.”
In this quote, I found a couple of interesting elements. Firstly, the imagery created in the phrase “whirlpool of snow twisting and spinning” (written in purple) is true to the classic Hosseini style. These few words are enough for me to picture a snowy setting taking place outside the comfort of the home, in a small village in Afghanistan. The whirlpool might not only refer to the literal winter storm happening, but also the anger that’s building up within Mariam Jo, inevitably making her abandon her mother. I also found an interesting play on words (written in green), which at first seemed similar to a personification, but when looked at more in depth, I found that it was describing a great feeling, just using an inanimate object, such as the snowflake, and connecting the two in a unique, fluid way. A snowflake, a delicate piece found in nature, made from the meticulous cycle of freezing water that pours itself on the Earth’s body, is what was used as a sigh heaved by an aggrieved woman. I also found (written in blue) that some of the dialogue sounded as if the pressures that were put upon them was because they were women. Now, in the story, the literal meaning behind such phrases scattered throughout the dialogue is from the perspective of social hierarchy and financial struggle, not necessarily gender patriarchy. Despite this, I found that these highlighted phrases worked well from the perspective of a woman during this time and situation, and seeing how they struggled.
Emulating this quote
II.) “With the passing of time, she would slowly tire of this exercise. She would find it increasingly exhausting to conjure up, to dust off, to resuscitate once again what was long dead. There would come a day, in fact, years later, when [she] would no longer bewail his loss. Or not as relentlessly; not nearly. There would come a day when the details of his face would begin to slip from memory’s grip, when overhearing a mother on the street call after her child by [his] name would no longer cut her adrift. She would not miss him as she did now, when the ache of his absence was her unremitting companion–like the phantom pain of an amputee.”
Alzheimer’s
With the passing of time, she swept even more. Sweeping the floor, dusting, shining, polishing. Time went at a snail’s pace; it was as if every second were an hour. She was long dead, her body was here, but her brain was long gone. There would come a day when she wouldn’t recognize him, a day when it felt as if two strangers roamed the same four walls, one of them inanimately sweeping. She would not miss him as she did now. It was as if she swept him out of her memory.
Bibilography:
- Devdhat, V. (2019). Powerful Themes to Appreciate in Khaled Hosseini’s Novels. Retrieved from https://booksrockmyworld.com/2017/05/17/powerful-themes-to-appreciate-in-khaled-hosseinis-novels/
- Fassler, J. (2019). How to Write: A Year in Advice from Franzen, King, Hosseini, and More. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/12/how-to-write-a-year-in-advice-from-franzen-king-hosseini-and-more/282445/
- Khaled Hosseini: Biography, Books & Awards | Study.com. (2019). Retrieved from https://study.com/academy/lesson/khaled-hosseini-biography-books-awards.html
- Shmoop Editorial Team. (2008, November 11). A Thousand Splendid Suns Themes. Retrieved April 14, 2019, from https://www.shmoop.com/a-thousand-splendid-suns/themes.html
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