Power Plays

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini is set in Afghanistan during a time of war. It covers many deep and powerful themes, but one of the most interesting and complex were the ideas of power and control that were explored throughout the book. Even in near-present day, examples of strong classism and racism are prevalent in the book. The books begins with the friendship between Amir, a wealthy boy, and his servant Hassan. 

It is here that the themes of power and control begin to come through.

Amir is watched over by Hassan. Hassan cooks for him, washes his clothes and defends him from neighborhood bullies despite the fact that they are the same age. Amir holds poet over Hassan, but resents him because Hassan is "too good" and Amirs father treats him like a son. This resentment and feeling of inferiority drives Amir to abuse his power. Hassan is illiterate, so Amir lies to him, saying that "imbecile" means "intelligent" in otder to tease him. Though Hassan doesn't even get to go to school, Amoi feels jealous to a point where he pelts Hassan with fruit. Hassan's true power shines through in these scenes- even while Amir is being cruel, he holds his ground and remains kind and accepting, simply taking Amirs violence when he could've fought back.

People throughout the story use and abuse their power to feel superior over others, when they themselves are insecure about their faults. Assef, an old school bully, was half Arabic and half German. Because he was insecure about being biracial, he set out for "racial purity," targeted against certain sects of Muslims. Later on, as an adult, he abused Hassan's son in a cruel display of power. He used Hassan's son as a tool to degrade Amir. 

In this book, power is a running theme. It showed me how people use power over others to cover up for their own insecurities and faults, because it is their own faults which they loathe most.