Comparing Suffering In The Kite Runner And Nawal El Saadawi

How is suffering presented in “The Kite Runner” and in “Woman at Point Zero?”

Suffering is a common theme in many books and is portrayed in many different ways such as in the novel “Life of Pi” where suffering is the driving force behind several of the characters' actions. In this essay I will be comparing how the novels “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini and “Woman at Point Zero” by Nawal El Saadawi present suffering. It plays a key role within both novels as it often affects how the characters in the world act and how the world within the books is presented. Both of the authors present suffering in some similar and some different ways. Khaled Hosseini and Nawal El Saadawi use their main characters such as Amir and Firdaus to show suffering

through a personal perspective. Hosseini also focusses on the plight of Afghanistan and how its people suffer whereas Saadawi focuses on the mistreatment of women as a way to explore anguish and oppression.

One way in which suffering and misery are shown within both novels is through the characters emotions. Amir is one of the characters in “The Kite Runner” that Hosseini uses to showcase emotional suffering. This type of suffering is shown clearly when Amir is young as he lacks any emotional connection with either of his parents. This gap is widened as Amir believes it is his fault for his mother’s death as she died in childbirth, as does his father Baba. This divide between him and his father can clearly be seen early in the novel when Baba says “If I hadn't seen the doctor pull him out of my wife with my own eyes, I’d never believe he’s my son.” Hosseini uses this as a way to change Amir as from this point onwards he changes how he behaves, believing that the only thing that matters is his father’s adoration. This in itself leads to greater emotional and physical suffering later in the novel. There are several other quotations which help to show the distance between Amir and Baba. “Baba and I lived in the same house, but in different spheres of existence.” This view is similarly shared by Barbara Bleiman in an article she wrote for Emagazine in 2011 where she also uses the quotation to show the rift between Amir and Baba.

This emotional suffering is also seen within “Woman at Point Zero” as Firdaus similarly lacks any emotional connection with her parents.

Early in the second chapter we can see how negative her relationship with both her parents is, with her father eating all the food so that the family starves, as well as being abusive to her mother. Whilst this happens we can see how negatively Firdaus mother acts as she gets increasingly gets angry with her and beats her. Her lack of connection with her parents can be seen when Firdaus says she was “born from a father who was not my father, and a mother who was not my mother.” This is very similar to how one example of emotional suffering is portrayed in “The Kite Runner” as both authors use a lack of emotional connection to display it. Both authors also go into great detail as to why their characters are distant from their parents. In “The Kite Runner” its seen when Baba acts disappointed when Amir fails to perform well in sporting activities and eventually culminates to his admittance that he does not view Amir as his son in Chapter Three. A quotation that shows this distance can be seen in Chapter Three after Amir cries during a game of Buzkashi “Mostly, I will never forget Baba’s valiant efforts to conceal the disgusted look on his face as he drove in silence.” Parallels can also be drawn between Baba and Amir's relationship and the story of Rostam and his son. Both Baba and Rostam lack a connection with their son, although for different reason their lack of connection ultimately leads to suffering. “Woman at Point Zero” is similar as Saadawi like Hosseini goes into great detail with several examples as to how Firdaus suffers

emotionally.

Similar to the previous examples, there are many other instances of emotional suffering within both of the writings. One other example form “Woman at Point Zero” is how Firdaus's partner Ibrahim leaves her. Saadawi does this to again force Firdaus into a worse position than before which helps her to come to the realisation that she hates men later in the novel. Saadawi goes into great detail about how Firdaus now feels much happier with Ibrahim which can be seen in the quotation “Everything around me floated in a radiant light, even the morning queue in front of the toilet.” This shows how even the most mundane things appeared splendid and even biblical in comparison to how Firdaus viewed the world before. This all makes her fall more powerful, especially since it is described from the first person. This kind of emotional trauma is also presented within “The Kite Runner” with how Baba has to keep the secret that Hassan is his son. Hosseini shows many times throughout the novel how much it affects him mentally. Examples of this include where Amir asks if they would ever replace Hassan and Ali with different servants and Baba's bad reaction to this. “I’ve never laid a hand on you, Amir, but you ever say that again... He looked away, shaking his head.” The greatest example of this can be seen when Ali and Hassan leave the service of Baba and how distraught he is at the time and even several years later at Amir's graduation.

There are also several other ways in which suffering is presented within both novels. One of these ways is the physical suffering that the characters go through. As before, the authors use the characters as a way to portray their anguish. I believe that they do this in order to make the trauma far more meaningful and personal as it is recalled in the first person. Sohrab a young boy suffers physically to great extent from when he was abused by the Taliban members as well as when he tried to take his own life by slitting his wrists. This shows how Hosseini links the different presentations of suffering as Sohrab's suicide attempt was brought about by his emotional abuse. Saadawi like Hosseini also manages to link the different kinds of suffering with the events that occur to Firdaus. A major example of this within the book is when she abducted by Bayoumi. He increasingly becomes more violent towards Firdaus beating her and eventually imprisoning her within his home and letting his friends have their way with her. This is similar to the ways in which Sohrab's suffering is presented as both experience violence and sexual abuse.

There are further examples of where physical violence and mental abuse overlap. This can clearly be seen within “The Kite Runner” with Hassan's rape. Like many of the other events within the piece it is extreme in the level of pain it causes for the character involved and those around them. The rape itself is extremely painful for Hassan physically as he is seen to be bleeding after the incident and mentally as it affects how he later acts towards Amir. It is also a huge cause of suffering for Amir as it causes him to feel immensely guilty leading to him developing insomnia. This can be seen within the quotation "That was a long time ago, but it's wrong what they say about the past, I’ve learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out." There are examples however where the rape of Hassan is not seen as a portrayal of different types of suffering. As an example Linda Hungary simply sees Hassan's rape as a way to manipulate the reader into feeling for Amir as he can be seen as an unlikeable character.

This kind of suffering can also be seen in “Woman at Point Zero” with Firdaus marriage to Sheikh Mahmoud. In this relationship Firdaus experiences utter disgust towards her husband which her Uncle forced her to marry. We can clearly see this when she “Would carefully wash my face and lips, my arms and thighs, and every part of my body” after having to touch him. She also experiences other forms of mental abuse where her husband uses every opportunity to argue her, as well as later abusing Firdaus physically by beating her. An example of this can be seen in the quotation “One day he found some leftover scraps of food, and started yelling at me so loudly all the neighbours could hear. After this incident he got into the habit of beating me whether he had a reason for it or not.” This clearly shows both mental and physical torment.

Finally both of the novels deal with suffering on a much wider scale than the pain of their main characters. Hosseini covers the large scale suffering of those who live in Afghanistan whilst Saadawi focuses on the plight of women in the Middle East. There are several examples of how Hosseini shows that Afghanistan is suffering. The broadest way in which this is done is how Afghanistan changes dramatically from when it was first seen by Amir as a child. The country is described as being far more desolate and even lifeless when compared to the country Amir knew when growing up. There are also more subtle ways in which the country is shown to be suffering. This can be seen when Amir visits the pomegranate tree he and Hassan used to climb. It is described as never being able to bear fruit again which links it to Afghanistan as it too is unlikely to recover. Hosseini could have used this simply to increase how much Amir suffers emotionally, as like before many examples of suffering overlap with one another. An example of how this combines with the issues within Afghanistan can be seen within the execution at the stadium where two people were stoned to death.

Whilst Saadawi does talk about the suffering of women she does not go into as much detail as Hosseini about Afghanistan. She does however have the idea of women's suffering throughout the whole of the novel, whose events make up this overarching theme, do contain a considerable amount of detail. This view is shared by Middle East International which says the book has “A realistic and sympathetic portrayal of Arab women.” There are however, opposing views to this where some view the portrayal of women as overly sympathetic and the book itself as an attack on men in the Middle East. Some critics also suggest that Saadawi simply plays to western prejudices and stereotypes in order to gain popularity in those areas. Both of these views are discussed in great detail in the magazine Al Jadid where Amal Amireh says “She is acclaimed not so much because she champions women's rights, but because she tells western readers what they want to hear.” The continuing theme of female suffering can be seen early in the book with Firdaus and her relationship with her parents, to how she is treated by Bayoumi and eventually how her pimp breaks the law but is allowed to as he commands more respect simply because he is a man. Despite the differences with “The Kite Runner” both of the novels break down the events into two major categories physical and emotional suffering. The writers' reasons for choosing their larger themes as ways to present suffering can be found in the background of the writers themselves, with Hosseini being born in Afghanistan and Saadawi being born in Egypt as well as feminist writer.

Ultimately the two novels present suffering in very similar ways. Firstly they both present several different variations of this such as the physical, as well as the emotional, often overlapping the two. A clear example, is the assaults of Hassan and Sohrab. The authors also use their characters as a way to show the reader clearly, who or what is suffering as the first person nature of both books allows a far more personal and detailed account of events. Both writings seem to present suffering as a necessity as it repeatedly occurs for all the characters especially within “The Kite Runner.” The two novels additionally show a strong connection with family and suffering even if they are both in different degrees. They also include much vaster levels of suffering by focusing on other minor characters. Finally the novels overlap different types of suffering in different locations which makes the characters far more complex and their suffering more realistic.