Nostalgia And Growth:the Identity Construction In The Kite Runner

Khaled Hosseini(1965-)as a dark horse in the literary field,is a contemporary Afghanborn American writer.Based on Hosseini’s personal experience,The Kite Runner opens a new window for readers to understand the Afghan religious beliefs,culture,and society.The Kite Runner was regarded as a coming-of-age story for a very long period,however,it goes far beyond that.Then this thesis chooses to reinterpret the novel from a special perspective that combines the theory of nostalgia with American Bildungsroman.Using the theory,this thesis on the one hand analyzes how Hosseini attempts to construct a reliable and solid social bond to keep away from the harsh and isolated reality.While on the other hand,it aims to explore Hosseini’s hybrid identity reconstruction in the Third Space under the mixture of the manifold identity resources.This thesis mainly consists of five parts.Chapter One is a brief introduction to Hosseini and his work The Kite Runner,showing relatively comprehensive foreign and domestic research perspectives and explaining the originality and significance of this thesis.Chapter Two expounds on the nostalgia theory and American Bildungsroman from its evolving process to its typical characteristics.Chapter Three and Chapter Four are the body parts of the thesis.It respectively reveals the nostalgic construction in the narratives of past Afghanistan and the hybrid identity construction in the narratives of Bildungsroman.From the nostalgic construction,the nostalgic self is built through the idealized time-space and a series of social bonds with the significant others in prewar Afghanistan,but the nostalgic self is largely ineffectual and the compensation is limited,which makes the nostalgic construction difficult to continue.Then Hosseini turns to the Third Space to construct a positive identity based on the protagonist’s heroic actions.Along with the alternative value,Hosseini successfully reduces the intensity of his identity crisis by conspiring with the mainstream ideology of America and reacquires a sense of belonging and self-continuity.Through his hybrid construction,Hosseini also constructed a series of alternative and somewhat universal values,these values are mainly embodied in his nostalgic construction of the idealized social bonds—through the humanitarian deeds of the common Afghan people,and culminated in the protagonist’s heroic actions of saving the life of Sohrab.Such a hybrid,positive image not only ennobles the protagonist’s growth process but also highlights the importance of the sense of belonging for a diasporic group.Chapter Five mainly concludes the whole thesis.