Suggestions
Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select.Please wait while we process your payment
If you don't see it, please check your spam folder. Sometimes it can end up there.
If you don't see it, please check your spam folder. Sometimes it can end up there.
Please wait while we process your payment
By signing up you agree to our terms and privacy policy.
Don’t have an account? Subscribe now
Create Your Account
Sign up for your FREE 7-day trial
Already have an account? Log in
Your Email
Choose Your Plan
Individual
Group Discount
Save over 50% with a SparkNotes PLUS Annual Plan!
Purchasing SparkNotes PLUS for a group?
Get Annual Plans at a discount when you buy 2 or more!
Price
$24.99 $18.74 /subscription + tax
Subtotal $37.48 + tax
Save 25% on 2-49 accounts
Save 30% on 50-99 accounts
Want 100 or more? Contact us for a customized plan.
Your Plan
Payment Details
Payment Summary
SparkNotes Plus
You'll be billed after your free trial ends.
7-Day Free Trial
Not Applicable
Renews October 6, 2023 September 29, 2023
Discounts (applied to next billing)
DUE NOW
US $0.00
SNPLUSROCKS20 | 20% Discount
This is not a valid promo code.
Discount Code (one code per order)
SparkNotes PLUS Annual Plan - Group Discount
Qty: 00
SparkNotes Plus subscription is $4.99/month or $24.99/year as selected above. The free trial period is the first 7 days of your subscription. TO CANCEL YOUR SUBSCRIPTION AND AVOID BEING CHARGED, YOU MUST CANCEL BEFORE THE END OF THE FREE TRIAL PERIOD. You may cancel your subscription on your Subscription and Billing page or contact Customer Support at custserv@bn.com. Your subscription will continue automatically once the free trial period is over. Free trial is available to new customers only.
Choose Your Plan
For the next 7 days, you'll have access to awesome PLUS stuff like AP English test prep, No Fear Shakespeare translations and audio, a note-taking tool, personalized dashboard, & much more!
You’ve successfully purchased a group discount. Your group members can use the joining link below to redeem their group membership. You'll also receive an email with the link.
Members will be prompted to log in or create an account to redeem their group membership.
Thanks for creating a SparkNotes account! Continue to start your free trial.
Please wait while we process your payment
Your PLUS subscription has expired
Please wait while we process your payment
Please wait while we process your payment
The book said a lot of things I didn’t know, things my teachers hadn’t mentioned…It also said some things I did know, like that people called Hazaras mice-eating, flat-nosed, load-carrying donkeys.
Amir is reflecting on the history of Afghanistan and how information was presented to him as a young student. The Hazaras are a group originally from Asia, and therefore have more Asian than Arabic features, and were historically persecuted by the Pashtuns. The information he gets from teachers and books provides the historical context for the racism he knew on the streets growing up. The ethnic and racial prejudice towards the Hazaras is a driving force behind Amir’s betrayal of Hassan and Hassan’s rape.
Hassan and I looked at each other. Cracked up. The Hindi kid would soon learn what the British learned earlier in the century, and what the Russians would eventually learn by the late 1980s: that Afghans are an independent people. Afghans cherish custom but abhor rules. And so it was with kite fighting. The rules were simple: No rules. Fly your kite. Cut the opponents. Good luck.
Amir’s thoughts touch upon the ethnic pride of the Afghanistan people, a pride that Baba exhibits and represents throughout the book. Afghanistan has been at the heart of warring factions and shifting values for years, but through it all, a sense of independence and esteem for custom in the Afghanistan people remain intact. The kite tournament with its lack of complex rules represents this independence. The only rule is to act, and count on your luck.
The Taliban moved into the house,” Rahim Khan said. “The pretext was that they had evicted a trespasser. Hassan’s and Farzana’s murders were dismissed as a case of self-defense. No one said a word about it. Most of it was fear of the Taliban, I think. But no one was going to risk anything for a pair of Hazara servants.
As Rahim Khan explains to Amir the murders of Hassan and Farzana, the degree to which Afghanistan has descended into turmoil and chaos is apparent. Law and order have nearly vanished under Taliban rule, and cases are easily dismissed under flimsy pretenses. Racial and ethnic profiling are common, and the Taliban murders at will. The fact that “no one will risk” anything for “a pair of Hazara servants” shows just how oppressed the Hazara are in Afghanistan.
‘Afghanistan is like a beautiful mansion littered with garbage, and someone has to take out the garbage.’ ‘That’s what you were doing in Mazar, going door-to-door? Taking out the garbage?’ ‘Precisely.’ ‘In the west, they have an expression for that, I said. They call it ethnic cleansing.’
Assef says these words to Amir towards the end of the novel, after he has become a full-fledged member of the Taliban. Assef’s words reveal the powerful rhetoric behind ethnically driven murder. He has been taught that Afghanistan is a “beautiful mansion” and the Hazara and other ethnically suppressed groups are “garbage” that must be “taken out.” Amir’s comment that “in the west . . . they call it ethnic cleansing” offers a different kind of rhetoric, one that reveals the brutality of that vision.
Please wait while we process your payment