From Self-absence To Self-realization

Khaled Hosseini,a famous contemporary Afghan-born American best-selling novelist, enjoys his worldwide reputation with his first novel The Kite Runner in literary circles. Since its publication in June 2003, this novel has been favorably accepted by the general readers and critics all over the world. It soon won multiple novel best new awards and quickly became one of the bestsellers in the world. In the year of 2006, this book was on the list of the American Book Association recommended books and the preferred book of the annual French reading club. Besides, in the same year, Hosseini was awarded the United Nations Humanitarian Award and was assumed as UNHCR(United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees goodwill ambassador). Therefore, Hosseini and his works have remained a hot topic for contemporary literary researchers. While, since being a new writer and his writings have remained few, study on Hosseini and his works is still limited at home and abroad.With the first person point of view and flashback narrative, the novel The Kite Runner tells a story of an Afghan boy’s childhood memories and the redemptive journey for his childhood fault after immigrating to America. The whole story begins with the end of Afghan monarchy and ends with the collapse of the Taliban regime over a span of nearly half century. Based on the prior researches and limitations, this thesis explores the protagonist’s growing journey from a new theoretical perspective of trauma theory. Through a close reading of the text of the novel, this thesis analyzes the personal redemptive journey and growing experience of the protagonist, interpreting step by step how the protagonist accomplishes his growing process from self-absence to self-realization with the influence of internal and external forces.In structure, this thesis can be mainly divided into four parts:The first part briefly introduces the author Khaled Hosseini and his works, offers the literature review on Hosseini’s The Kite Runner from home and abroad, and then gives a general introduction of trauma theory.The second and the third part, immigration as the dividing line, is the main part of this paper. The second part focuses on the protagonist Amir’s growing process in the adolescent period before immigration with the analysis of the text, the factors blocking Amir’s growth and the kite image in this period. The third part explores Amir’s growth in his adulthood after immigration through probing the text, the factors influencing Amir’s maturity and the kite image in this period. These two chapters analyze the four stages of the protagonist’s growing journey: lost—anxiety—awakening—maturity.The fourth part is the conclusion. Based on the foregoing three parts, this part provides a summary of the research content and significance of this thesis. Combing with reality, it reminds people to pay close attention to all kinds of trauma in life and offers an instructive way to help dealing with trauma in daily life.The Kite Runner has presented an historical epic scene and a touching story about humanity, which has deeply moved hundreds of millions of readers in the whole world. It reveals a country with rich historical and cultural background but still suffering from constant wars and repression. Against this background, based on personal, social and cultural factors, the protagonist has undergone serious psychological trauma during his growth. In describing the hero’s inner trauma, this novel also reveals his progress to go to self-fulfillment. It further points out that spiritual trauma may not be able to heal, but through personal efforts, trauma will be gradually eased or eliminated. Since trauma is a personal experience of suffering, if the victims have developed a right conception of themselves and the traumatic event itself, they will discover that their heart can become much stronger after going through difficulties and trauma.