what are some good questions to ask about a thousand splendid suns
All men must grow beards…
All women must stay within at all times…
No woman, under whatsoever circumstances, may evidence her face…
Singing is forbidden.
Dancing is forbidden.
Playing cards, playing chess, gambling and kite flying are forbidden.
Writing books, watching films and painting pictures are forbidden.
Cosmetics are forbidden.
Jewelry is forbidden.
Women will not wear charming clothes.
Women will non speak unless spoken to.
Women volition not laugh in public.
Girls are for
All men must grow beards…
All women must stay inside at all times…
No woman, nether whatever circumstances, may show her face…
Singing is forbidden.
Dancing is forbidden.
Playing cards, playing chess, gambling and kite flying are forbidden.
Writing books, watching films and painting pictures are forbidden.
Cosmetics are forbidden.
Jewelry is forbidden.
Women will non wear charming wearing apparel.
Women will not speak unless spoken to.
Women volition not laugh in public.
Girls are forbidden from attending schoolhouse.
Women are forbidden from working.
If y'all steal, your mitt volition be cutting off.
If you commit infidelity, you will be stoned to expiry…
Mind. Listen well. Obey.
Welcome to Taliban country.
What is the enduring allure of dystopias? Why practise we keep on reading about these hellish landscapes where humanity is long dead? Perchance information technology's just the devil within, that makes many of us stop and stare at route accidents; maybe there is a cathartic effect, showing u.s.a. that however bad things are, they could be worse. Or maybe it is the fascination of watching the human spirit soar higher up the inhuman universe. Almost probably, it is a combination of all three.
Taliban-ruled Afghanistan is a dystopia with a departure: instead of being hatched in the encephalon of some gifted writer, it is one which existed, very most to us in time and space. For the second time, Khaled Hosseini trains his spotlight on his unfortunate abode country-however, whereas in The Kite Runner it was only a plot device for the protagonist'southward personal redemptive journey, hither it is one of the main characters, this land of A Grand Splendid Suns.
This novel is the story of ii women, and through them, Woman in full general; equally she exists and endures in almost parts of the globe. Marginalised, a vagina in her youth, a womb in her womanhood, and a pair of easily for sweeping and cleaning in her old historic period. Created by God equally an reconsideration as a playmate to His star cosmos which He fabricated in His ain paradigm.
Mariam is a harami, born on the other side of the coating to the wealthy Jalil Khan and his housekeeper Nana. Nana accepts the fact they are outcasts, while Mariam doesn't. She demands her share of her father's honey, which he is ready to give on the sly – the problem is, she wants it publicly. Her insistence on visiting her father at his town house ends in her mother's suicide. Orphaned Mariam, an embarrassment to her father and his three wives, is married off at fifteen to Rasheed, an elderly widower… with whom she endures a loveless and abusive union. She is besides an object of shame to him because she consistently fails in carrying a baby to term.
Laila is improve off as far every bit family is concerned – she has an educated and loving begetter, a mother who is much more considerate than many others (even though she is slowly on her way to madness because of her missing sons who have gone off to fight the Soviets), and a charming friend, the i-legged Tariq, who is fast becoming much more than a friends as the children mature. All the same, her world slowly starts to unravel every bit Afghanistan'due south war with the USSR is won and so the various resistance groups starts fighting among themselves. 1 of her best friends meets a horrible decease, another friend is married off, and Tariq leaves for Pakistan with his family. Ironically, when her family finally decides to movement to Pakistan, a stray missile lands on her home killing both her parents. The injured Laila is taken in by Rasheed; with ulterior motives, it is soon revealed. However, she has no option but to become the 2d wife of the lecherous onetime man as she is carrying Tariq's illegitimate child: and the news of Tariq's death has come from beyond the border.
Equally Afghanistan moves through the Civil war era to the Taliban era, the two women, initially hostile, form a bond. The bond is strengthened when Laila gives birth to a girl and loses glamour in the eyes of Rasheed, making her a fellow-sufferer with Mariam: and Mariam simply loves Aziza, Laila's daughter, all the more because she is a little harami like herself!
Things slowly screw to a climax when Tariq returns. It seems the story of his expiry has been manufactured by Rasheed. In a climax slightly reminiscent of a Hindi movie in the best Bollywood tradition, Mariam puts paid to her brute of a husband with a garden shovel, equally he is trying to strangle Laila. Laila escapes with Tariq and her children, while Mariam confesses to her law-breaking and receives the Taliban's swift and brutal justice.
In the last role, nosotros notice Laila returning to the Taliban-exorcised Transitional islamic state of afghanistan, where she makes a pilgrimage to Mariam'southward birthplace and unexpectedly receives the money left for Mariam by her repentant begetter. With it, she revives the orphanage and school where Aziza had been given shelter during the worst years of her life. Nosotros go out the story with the news of her third child growing inside her – whose name is already fixed (we can all guess what information technology will be!), should it turn out to be a girl.
*
Khaled Hosseini is definitely not a literary writer. His style is emotional: the story is given all importance, non the way it is delivered. In that location were complaints (rather justified, IMO) about the lack of dimension of the characters, especially the villain, in The Kite Runner: Hosseini was accused of playing upwardly to the gallery by vilifying the Islamic world for the benefit of a largely Western audience. In hindsight, I have to reluctantly agree, even though I loved that book.
A G Fantabulous Suns is slightly better in the sense that all the characters are meliorate drawn. The Taliban are shown as man beings, even though believers in a barbarian philosophy. Rasheed is unabashedly evil, however: simply that has naught to do with religion or geography – SOB's like him are a dime to dozen in almost all third-world countries. All the same, the women protagonists are well-etched. Thankfully, they fight back even when the dice is loaded against them.
The novel follows a beaten path: there are very few surprises. The narrative construction is linear, and the author does not claiming the reader at whatsoever time within the narrative. The consequence is a story which flows at breakneck footstep, loaded with emotion. We root for the expert guys and boo the bad guys at all the appropriate places. And in the end, when Mariam cracks open Rasheed'south skull, we stand and applaud. Just I practice not intendance if the emotion is cheap – I thoroughly enjoyed it. 1 needs to load upwardly on junk food now and then!
The most noteworthy thing about A Thou First-class Suns is the way Afghanistan is portrayed: one weeps for the destruction of a beautiful country, gang-raped and mutilated by hordes and hordes of marauders. One wishes that the electric current tenuous peace holds, then that she can become back on her anxiety.
*
Once a taxi commuter here talked to me about his family unit back in Pakistan, on the hilly borderland well-nigh Afghanistan. These areas are still exterior the police scanner and largely controlled past the Taliban. He told me how his brilliant daughter was forced out of school by armed men on pain of expiry. He had wanted to make her a doctor, and at present she was confined to sooty pots and pans in the backyard. The poor man was almost in tears.
I remembered him when Mariam brought down the shovel the second time on Rasheed'due south head. She was hit a blow for the taxi-driver'due south girl: and all such women, crushed nether the iron kicking of tradition which gives them beingness only as man'southward playthings and possessions.
You are fearsome: yet I bow to you lot, O Female parent.
Edit to add:
I think she has to exist here.
Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/128029.A_Thousand_Splendid_Suns?qid=zJanVic6Ib&rank=1
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