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Essay On Courage
Essay On Courage
Courage : the most potent of virtues
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Courage is not the absence of fear. It is fighting one’s way through, no matter what challenges are waiting ahead. Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, features various individuals utilizing courage to overcome the adversities they face in Afghanistan and America. Amir, the protagonist is a coward person who will have to face many situations that require courage. Hassan is Amir’s friend who displays bravery whenever it is necessary, especially if Amir is involved. Baba who’s known to be a courageous person will face various situations that requires bravery and often challenges his beliefs. When an individual commits an act of courage, then they will further nurture their personal integrity, because they managed to overcome their fears and express …show more content…
When Assef and his friends cornered Hassan and Amir, Hassan threatened them even though he is outnumbered. Hassan suppressed his fears with the intent to protect Amir. This heroic act, truly shows how Hassan prioritizes Amir’s safety. Hassan and Assef once again met after the kite competition, when Hassan went to ran the kite that Amir ordered him to. Assef cornered Hassan and sexually assaulted him. Hassan allowed Assef to do it, because it is the only way to obtain the kite that Amir wanted. It took a substantial amount of determination and courage for Hassan to let Assef sexually assault him. Hassan’s desire to make Amir happy, can be plainly seen on this incident. It seems though that Hassan’s unwavering loyalty is still inadequate to prevent Amir from betraying Hassan again by framing him for theft. When Baba asked Hassan if he really took Amir’s money and watch, Hassan said yes. Hassan did this, knowing that their is a possibility that Baba will punish him. This act of courage truly expresses Hassan’s desire to protect Amir. Hassan’s feats of bravery certainly defines his identity and plainly exhibits his loyalty to …show more content…
Baba once risked his life in order to protect a woman from a Russian soldier. Baba opposed the Russian soldier because his plans goes against Baba’s morals. By risking his life, Baba remained true to himself and his morals. When Amir and Baba arrived at America, Baba refused the food stamps offered to them. Baba wants all his possessions to come from his hard work. Accepting the food stamps, goes against this thought, thus even though Baba’s aware of the hardships will have to face, he still refused to accept the food stamps. Baba’s boldness to decline help and face poverty further emphasizes his true morals. At some point in the novel, Baba will learn that he had acquired cancer, but will refuse to undergo chemotherapy. Baba is a the type of person that prefers to face any matters head on and this applies even to cancer. Refusing the chemotherapy, only highlights Baba’s recklessness and the preference to take everything head on. Baba’s personality is clearly evident each time he commits a courageous act.
If an individual manages to display audacity in any situation that it is necessary, then they will nurture their personal integrity, due to them being able to stand up for their ideals. In The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini, Amir, Baba and Hassan had undergone various circumstances requiring them to utilize courage and
Mark Twain best described courage when he said that, “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear” (Twain). Both in The One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey and Watership Down by Richard Adams, the authors deal with the topic of courage and each share a similar view on it as this quote. Indeed, both authors suggest that courage is not accumulated simply by acts of heroism, but rather by overcoming fears and speaking one’s mind as well. These books are very similar in the way that bravery is displayed through the characters in an uncommon way. Firstly, an example of bravery
An example of courage, as the judgment that something else is more important than fear, is through the character of Kak in B for Buster by Iain Lawrence. In this novel, Kak is characterized as a young, determined boy, desiring to turn himself from a comic book reading boy into a World War II hero. Planning to escape his drunken, abusive father, Kak enlists himself in the Canadian Air Force although he is underage and only sixteen years old. During his first mission, he is becomes frightened of the risk of not coming home alive, but doesn?t show his emotions because of his austere, intrepid crewmen. During this mission, Kak did not have an absence of fear, but he felt that becoming a hero like the ones in his comic book, and accomplishing his dream of fly, was more important than his fear of dying.
Amir is, to be put bluntly, a coward. He is led by his unstable emotions towards what he thinks will plug his emotional holes and steps over his friends and family in the process. When he sought after Baba’s invisible love, Amir allowed Hassan to be raped in an alleyway just so that the blue kite, his trophy that would win his father’s heart, could be left untouched. In the end, he felt empty and unfulfilled with the weight of his conscience on his shoulders comparable to Atlas’ burden. Unable to get over his fruitless betrayal, he lashes out and throws pomegranates at Hassan before stuffing money and a watch under his loyal friend’s pathetic excuse for a bed, framing Hassan for theft and directly causing the departure of both servants from his household. Even after moving to America, finding a loving wife, and creating a career for himself in writing, he still feels hollow when thinking of his childhood in Afghanistan. Many years later, he is alerted of Hassan’s death and sets out on a frenzied chase to find his friend’s orphaned son. He feels that he can somehow ease his regrets from all of those years ago if he takes in Hassan’s son, Sohrab. He finds Sohrab as a child sex slave for Assef, who coincidentally was the one to rape Hassan all of those years ago. After nearly dying in his attempt to take back Sohrab, he learns that he can take the damaged child back to the states with him. Sadly, Hassan’s son is so
The only way for Amir to redeem himself of his repercussions is through a challenging process of sacrifice and self-discovery. Although one is unsure at this point whether Amir succeeds at his endeavors, it is clear that this story
Hassan agrees and gives chase for the kite with Amir follow some time later on. However, during that time Hassan is corner by Assif and several others children. Hassan is then punished by Assif for protecting Amir, as well as being a different type of Afghani. In one swift motion, Assif performs a horrifying sexual act on Hassan, all the way Amir watch it far down a street. And what does Amir do? Well he ran as he put it, “I ran because I was a coward. I was afraid of Assef and what he would do to me. I was afraid of getting hurt” (77).
The way our friends treat us in the face of adversity and in social situations is more revealing of a person’s character than the way they treats us when alone. In Khaled Hosseini’s novel The Kite Runner, ethnic tensions, nationality, and betrayal become the catalyst that drives and fuels Amir, Assef, and other characters to embark on their particular acts of cruelty. Serving as a way to illustrate the loss of rectitude and humanity, cruelty reveals how easily people can lose their morals in critical circumstances. Through Amir, Assef, and the Taliban’s actions, cruelty displays the truth of a person’s character, uncovering the origin of their cruelty. Amir’s cruelty spurs from his external environment and need for love from his father, choosing
He is seen as a good man building an orphanage and wrestling “a black bear in Baluchistan with his bare hands.”(Hosseini 12) leaving scars on his back. Even though Baba’s move to America meant he must leave his title “Toopha Agah” or “Mr. Hurricane” (Hosseini 12) in Kabul, Afghanistan, it does not mean that he must leave his kind heart there as well. During Baba’s time in America, he continued his kind hearted acts like spending his whole life savings on Amir’s wedding to Soraya, and refusing food stamps and treatment for cancer. Because it is known that Baba is a kind hearted man, it is not surprising at all that he would fight off a black bear, and those couple scars on his back are just a couple pieces of evidence to show that “You are what you do, not what you say you’ll
In the narrative Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, discrimination pushes characters to do various things to gain acceptance from their peers and superiors. Amir feels he needs to be accepted by Baba as a son and by Hassan as a friend as well as Hassan wants to be accepted by Amir as a genuine friend. As Martin Luther King Jr. said, discrimination is a constant reminder of our flaws. The discrimination performed in Kite Runner is what creates the theme of the search for acceptance of those flaws.
Assef's vow comes true during the day of Amir's favorite sport: "kite fighting". In this sport, children fly their kites and try to "slice" each other's kite. Amir wins the tournament, and Baba's praise, with his kite the last one flying, but when Hassan goes to fetch the last cut kite, a great trophy, Assef and two henchmen are there instead. Hassan tries to protect Amir's kite, but Assef beats Hassan and brutally rapes him. Amir hides and watches Hassan and is too scared to help him. Afterwards, Hassan becomes emotionally downcast. Amir knows why but keeps it a secret, and things are never the same between the two. After hearing a story from Rahim Khan, Amir decides it would be best for Hassan to go away. Amir frames Hassan as a thief but Baba forgives him, even though he admits to committing
One moment can shape the rest of someone’s life in a positive or in a negative way. According to Aristotle, “a man cannot become a hero until he can see the root of his own downfall.” In the book “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini you follow a story of a male from Afghanistan named Amir that grew up around the time of the Russian invasion into Afghanistan. Amir eventually moves to Fremont, California in the United States with his father, Baba, for safety from the war. During this book Amir’s is explaining about his childhood relationships around 1975 through flashbacks and what he does to deal with these relationships. Specifically the relationship with his closest friend, Hassan. Hassan was a boy that Amir grew up with because Hassan was a servant in their household. Amir explains that what he is today has come from what had happened when he was twelve. A tragic hero is a character that makes an error in judgment that’s leads to a tragedy in their life. Amir is a
Baba ran from the truth, and so did Amir to protect the family name, even if that meant betraying the people closest to him. Baba was a man more worried about his image than anything, and that is what he taught his son as well. Slowly that is all Amir knew how to do: protect his family and himself, leading him into a life of guilt, and running from people when situations were challenging, instead of making the admirable decision and helping a friend. He shows his unconditional love when he suddenly packs up and leaves all he has ever known, “‘[Ali and Hassan] can’t live [there] anymore.life here is impossible for [them] now”’
Throughout the story, Amir and Hassan became increasingly distant from each other. Amir constantly tests Hassan’s loyalty to himself, unsure of whether or not Hassan is truly his friend but more his servant. With everybody’s hate towards Hazaras, Amir’s judgement and diction is clouded by their bias and soon too believes that Hazaras are inferior. This becomes more evident during the kite running tournament, Hassan was running for a kite to end the tournament and got surrounded by bullies; ended up getting raped. During the entire time, Amir stood there and just watched Hassan get raped, rationalizing his decision by deciding that Hazaras are inferior to everybody else shown by “The answer floated to my conscious mind before I could thwart
In Khaled Hosseini’s novel “The Kite Runner,” he illustrates a fine line between what is defined as morally good and evil. During their lives as kids, Amir and Hassan had always been close, but there had always been one problem. Amir was the son of a rich and powerful Pashtun man who was almost always given everything he wanted, while Hassan was a Hazara boy who had spent his life serving Amir and his family with his father. Although the two of them seemed to always be inseparable when they played games or flew kites, there was always the defining factor of who they really are, a servant and his master.
The man who wears different masks and rarely unravels the secrets he keeps, is often the man who carries a heavy burden. In the start of Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, Baba is presented as this morally driven character who stood as the icon of determination. However, as the story progress readers uncover that he was no man that could “drop the devil to his knees.” (13) Instead he is revealed to be flawed character who suffered just like the rest, but kept it hidden through his actions. As Amir’s father he was not the warmest when interacting with his son, in fact he was described to have been impatient during their interactions. Despite their constrained relationship it’s slowly revealed why he acted so.
Everybody in this world has a talent. He or she can use his talent to express about himself or herself. Also, the writers can explain some themes from their societies in their articles, novels, and books. The artistic works can treat some problems and face the society with it. For an example, Khaled Hosseini on his novel The Kite Runner, explains some themes from the society like, how the children affected by their parents, how the society and the religious matter effect on the people, and the value of having someone by your side supports you.