English analysis for chapters 19 and 20

1. English analysis for chapters 19 and 20 By Georgia Mills

2. Chapter 19 What happens? • Amir returns to Taliban-held Afghanistan to rescue Sohrab. • Farid the driver accuses Amir of always having been a visitor in his own country. • Wahid, Farid’s brother, gives Amir all the food he and his family have to eat. • Farid agrees to help Amir once he realises his reason for returning.

3. What we learn about Farid We learn that Farid is 29 even though he is mentioned as looking older, ‘lined face of a man 20 years older’. We know he is poor from the run down house his brother Wahid lives in which Hosseini through Amir describes as being, ‘dilapidated one story house’.

4. Dinner at Wahid's As Amir is eating he notices Wahid’s three children staring at his digital watch so gives it to them however later on he comes to realises it was not the watch they wanted. ‘I understand now why the boys hadn’t shown any interest in the watch at all’. Amir leaves some money under his family. This action of kindness shows he feels for the family and gives him a chance to reflect on how lucky he is. You could argue it is the start of his fight to gain back redemption.

5. “I feel like a tourist in my own country” Passage found on page 214 and 215. “Strange,” I said. “What?” “I feel like a tourist in my own country”, I said, taking in a goatherd leading a half-dozen emaciated goats along the side of the road. Farid snickered. Tossed his cigarette. “You still think of this place as your country?” “I think part of me always will,” I said, more defensively than I had intended. “After twenty years of living in America,” he said, swerving the truck to avoid a pothole the size of a beach ball. I nodded. “I grew up in Afghanistan.” Farid Snickered again. “why do you do that?” “never mind,” he murmured. “No, I want to know. Why do you do that?” In his rear view mirror, I saw something flash in front of his eyes. “You want to know?” he sneered. “Let me imagine, Agha Sahib. You probably lived in a big two- or three-story house with a nice backyard that your gardener filled with flowers and fruit trees. All gated of course. Your father drove an American car. You had servants, probably Hazaras. Your parents hired workers to decorate the house for the fancy mehmanis they threw, so their friends would come over to drink and boast about their travels to Europe or America. And I bet my first son’s eye this is the first time you’ve ever worn a Pakol.” He grinned at me revealing a mouthful of prematurely rotting teeth.

6. “I feel like a tourist in my own country”Part 2: (Points) • Amir feels like a ‘tourist in his own country’ showing the extent of distance there is between the country he once knew and the one he grew up in. • Farid‘sneers’ and ‘snickers’at Amir’s comments. • Amir has not seen the poorer side of the country and Farid knows this which is why he goes on to make an assumption of Amir’s life. As the reader we know this is correct and so does Amir, making him feel unwelcomed. This makes the reader empathise with Farid as you start to understand that life has not been kind to him. • Farid responds to Amir when he asks why he is saying these things: “that’s the Afghanistan I know. You? You’ve always been a tourist here, you just didn’t know it.” • The following phrases, ‘nice backyard’, ‘filled with flowers’, ‘American car’, ‘hired workers’, ‘fancy mehmanis’are all symbolic of Amir’s ‘nice’ , ‘fancy’ life.

7. “Discarded toys” Amir starts to see part of the country he never knew existed as he had a privileged life whilst living in Kabul. Driving through Pakistan Amir notices the ‘signs of poverty everywhere’ which I believe make him realise how lucky he is that he was able to escape to America. The signs of poverty drive him to try and find Sohrab. The extent of the derelict villages is shown by Hosseini in the form of a simile through Amir’s thoughts, ‘villages sprouting here and there like discarded toys among the rocks’ the use of this simile shows to the audience that it is a common occurrence to see both worn-down, deserted villages lying about the place. This creates the image of a destroyed town on its last legs. The villages are compared to toys highlighting to the audience that the villages were once cared for and lived in by people, similar to toys being used and played with however the villages have now just been left like unused toys. This indicates to the reader the Taliban has had a significant impact on the country causing people to leave as well as being killed. The adjective ‘discarded’ suggest the villages have been left to deteriorate connoting to the audience that the Taliban have played a large role in the outcome of these villages. This leaves the reader feeling sorry for the people who have suffered from the actions of the Taliban.

8. Chapter 20what happens? • Amir sees signs of the wars, such as broken-down Soviet tanks and destroyed villages. When Amir and Farid reach Kabul, Amir does not recognize it. • Farid rebukes Amir, saying the Taliban will use any excuse for violence, and an old beggar speaks up in agreement with Farid. The beggar, it turns out, was a literature professor and once knew Sofia Akram, Amir’s mother. • Amir and Farid find the orphanage where they think Sohrab is. The director, Zaman, is cautious and doesn’t admit that he has seen Sohrab until Amir says he is Sohrab’s half-uncle. • The orphanage itself was once a storage warehouse for a carpet manufacturer. There are hundreds of children and not enough beds, mattresses, or blankets. • The director of the orphanage (Zaman) tells Amir and Farid that the official took Sohrab a month ago. If they want to find him, he will be at Ghazi Stadium the next day.

9. Emotional effect The character of Amir occasionally talks in the past tense indicating to the audience he is recollecting on his memories from events which have already happened. This tells the reader he misses the way Kabul used to be and wished he’d done things differently. At this moment in the book Amir says ‘I was seeing it through Farids eyes’. The preposition of the word ‘it’ regards Kabul and how at last Amir is accepting Kabul for what it really is: a run down, deserted city. This has an emotional effect on the reader because its as though Amir does not want to let go of the home town he once knew. It makes the reader empathise with Amir as well know it can be hard to adapt to the truth. The use of this metaphor makes the audience realises that Amir is now seeing Kabul in the way Farid had warned it was like. He can now fully appreciate what has happened to Kabul just as Farid already has.

10. Amir notices that his home town has been demolished; trees cut down and how shops that were once there have been destroyed. The Soviets cut the trees down because snipers would hide in them, and Afghans cut them down to use for firewood to heat their homes. Many afghans had been left without a job or home due to the actions of the Taliban. Hosseini uses a simple sentence which starts a paragraph where the characters near a village called Jadeh Maywand. The simple sentence; ‘Rubble and Beggars’ puts into to perspective the first thing that Amir had noticed suggesting to the reader that this is what the village of Jadeh Maywand is now. The character of Amir uses the past tense to talk to Farid about how he remembers the village, ‘there used to be shops,’ ‘I used to buy kites’. The word ‘used’ is an idiom which the audience can identify as the past tense showing how Amir remembers the village; this also shows the reader how much the Taliban have influenced the village by ruining it. Similarly it leaves the reader feeling upset for those living throughout Afghanistan. To put it into perspective the Taliban have taken away the rights of the afghan people to a home, free life, money and education.

11. Sandcastle Quote & the city Hossieni through the character of Amir compares the town to a sandcastle, ‘Jadeh Maywand had turned into a giant sandcastle’. This metaphor compares the town to being a castle made of sand which can easily be ruined by the sea; in this case the sea is the Taliban who can easily destroy houses within the town.

12. At the orphanage Zaman reveals what is happening at the orphanage declaring that the Taliban Official takes one child a month in return for money. Zaman relies on this money to care for the one-hundred children living there as There is ‘not enough’ beds, food or blankets for all the children. This showing how valuable the money is to Zaman in order to do his best for caring for the children. This makes the audience sympathise with Zaman because he has no choice but to give a child to the Taliban Official otherwise the children would starve. The character of Farid does not show sympathy for Zaman and attacks him for letting this happen to poor, innocent children. Hosseini through Amir describes a moment in the fight, ‘the director thrashed beneath Farid’ The onomatopoeia ‘barked’ is used to describe the way Farid is speaking to Zaman emphasising to the audience that Farid is angry, making the reader feel concerned for Zaman. Another thing Zaman says to Amir is that “there are a lot of children in Afghanistan but little childhood”.

13. Exam questions Analytical questions: How does Hosseini create an image of the run down Afghanistan in these chaptersand what impression does this create for the reader. Creative response: Write a diary entry, in the first person, as the character Wahid talking about the arrival of Amir and Farid.