A Thousand Splendid Suns Essay

A Thousand Splendid Suns written by Khaled Hossieni is indeed a marvelous and heart-aching story about survival in a battle-run country. Khaled Hosseini was born on March 4th, 1965 in Kabul, Afghanistan (“Biography”). He witnessed first-hand the horror of war, and soon immigrated to America in 1980 (“Biography”). Khaled became a trained physician in St. Jose, California but writing still remained his passion (“Biography”). To date, he has written three novels, the first one being a worldwide sensation, The Kite Runner. Even though, his writing is fiction, Hosseini brings to light many real problems the Afghan people face in his novel. He has been awarded the Original Voices Award, Borders group for The Kite Runner in 2004 and Richard and Judy’s Best Read of the Year for A Thousand Splendid Suns in

By now, Afghanistan was starting to catch the attention of foreign powers, as Russia could now establish a trade route with India by capturing or controlling Afghanistan because it bordered India ("History of Afghanistan"). Discussions between Amir Dost and Russia angered Britain, which ultimately caused the British to invade Afghanistan ("History of Afghanistan"). The First Anglo-war (1838) failed, as Afghan troops won, but in the second one (1878), the British won ("History of Afghanistan"). Britain had full control over Afghanistan until 1919, when the King of Afghanistan, Amanullah declared independence and war against Britain. After a month of fighting, the British approved the independence of Afghanistan as a nation ("History of Afghanistan"). Humiliated, Britain conspired with traditional religious parties who were dissatisfied with Amanullah’s attempts to secularize and reform the country ("History of Afghanistan"). This led to a civil war that eventually overthrew him. Amanullah was succeeded by Muhammad Zahir Shah in 1929 ("History of Afghanistan"). The following 40 years of Zahir’s reign was a display of power, he was seen as a tyrant by