The Kite Runner
The Kite Runner Chapter Review of Narrative Aspects Chapter 1; It is December 2001, and our narrator, recalls an event that occurred in 1975, when he was twelve years old and growing up in Afghanistan. He doesn’t say what happened, but says it made him who he is. He follows this recollection by telling us about a call he received last summer from a friend in Pakistan, Rahim Khan. Rahim Khan asks Amir, to come to Pakistan to see him. When Amir gets off the phone, he takes a walk through San Francisco, where he lives now.
He notices kites flying, and thinks of his past, including his friend Hassan. Narrative aspects: Narrative voice: 1st person narrative, ‘I became what I am today’ – Amir tells us a story about his past, and what he remembers, from his point of view. Indirect speech, ‘I thought about something Rahim Khan said…. There is a way to be good again. ’ – it doesn’t let the reader make a relationship with the other character, as this chapter is all about Amir.
- Setting: Introduces the alley almost straight away, ‘I have been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years’ – it gives us a mysterious setting, and the alley becomes a key symbol of misdeeds in the novel. Talks about where he is while telling the story, ‘like a pair of eyes looking down on San Francisco. ’ – gives us a brief idea of where he is and wants us to find out why he is there, as it also talks about Afghanistan and Pakistan.
- Structure: the repetition of kites, ‘saw a pair of kites, red with long blue tails, soaring in the sky. ’ ‘twin kites. ’ – significant because it sticks in a reader’s brain as they try to work out how the kites may be significant in the rest of the novel. Which they find out they are. Also ‘twin kites’ can refer to Hassan and Amir, as they are brothers and the last kite they ran together made their friendship fall apart. Non- linear, it talks about different points of his life in a very short amount of time, because he is ooking back on his life as well as telling the reader what is happening in his life while he is telling the story.
- Form: Monologue, speaks in broken language, almost like in his thoughts he can’t put in words what he is thinking and what he remembers, ‘I looked up at those twin kites. I thought about Hassan. Thought about Baba. Ali. Kabul. ’- it gives the reader an impression that there is a lot to find out about Amir. Retrospective Narrative, he is looking back on his past, and the opening chapter makes us curious about what will happen next.
