This explores the significance of various settings in The Kite Runner.

1. THE KITE RUNNER
Setting and Characterisation

2. SETTING
• How is setting important in narratives?
• What are the different settings in The Kite Runner?
• Could the Kite Runner be set in Bedworth?

3. Relationships
innocence
Racism
Universal
Themes
ideas
Courage
War
Love

4. Literature
Political
events
Race
Influences
of Setting
Culture
Marriage

5. Afghanistan Afghanistan
Kabul:
The Alley
Amir’s house
Hazarajat
Hasan’s House
Kaka
Gharja Lake
Homayoun’s
The
house
Kabul
orphanage
The Lorry
The stadium
Assef’s Office
The Study
Wahid’s house
The
Pomegranite
tree
Pakistan
America
Russia
California
Islamabad
Golden
Gate Bridge
Russian
Soldier
The mosque
The Market
The hospital
Peshawar
Soraya’s
house
Views of
Russia

6. AFGHANISTAN

7. All stories have settings. These may be real or fictional places,
however, they all represent something.
Baba paid for the construction of the two
storey orphanage (p12)…We found the
new orphanage …it was a flat barracksstyle building with splintered walls and
windows boarded with planks of wood.
(220)
I went past the rosebushes to
Baba‟s mansion…Hassan to
the mud shack. I remember it
was spare, clean, dimly lit by a
pair of Kerosene lamps (p6)
AFGHANISTAN
Now the pitch
was a mess.
There were
Assef‟s office
holes and
“there was a coffee
craters
table….The base was X
everywhere,
shaped, walnut sized brass most notably a
balls studded the ring where pair of deep
holes in the
the metallic legs crossed”.
ground…(234)
We were upstairs in Baba‟s
study, the smoking
room…Then he lowered
himself into the leather sofa…I
watched him fill his glass at
the bar..
I sat against one of the
house‟s clay walls. The
kinship I felt suddenly for
the old land...it surprised
me…I planted a fistful of
money under the matress.
Basement/Lorry
The fuel tank was pitch black. (105106)..There were others in all about a dozen,
including Baba and me sitting with our
suitcases between our legs cramped with
these strangers in the tarpaulin-covered cap
of an old Russian truck (96-97).

8. We snaked our way
among the merchants
and the beggars
wandered through the
narrow alleys (p23)
Hazarajat: The same day my
father put Homaira and her family
on a lorry and sent them off to
Hazarajat.
AFGHANISTAN
We sat at a picnic table on
the banks of the lake. The
water was deep blue and
sunlight glittered on its
looking glass-clear surface.
(p12)
The Alley:
Becomes a personal
Metaphor.
I smiled. “bas you donkey. No-one‟s sending
you away…Do you want to go climb our
tree…There was an old abandoned cemetery
atop the hill with rows of unmarked
headstones…There was a pomegranate tree
near the entrance...(p24)
I sat against one of the
housr‟s clay walls. The
kinship I felt suddenly for
the old land...it surprised
me…I planted a fistful of
money under the matress.
Afghanistan –
“Returning to
Kabul was like
returning to an
old, forgotten
friend and seeing
life hadn‟t been
good to him.
There were hedges that, in the
summer, the gardener shaped
like animals…could hear..the
music the laughter. It shouldn’t
have felt this way. Baba and I
were finally friends.

9. All stories have settings. These may be real or fictional places,
however, they all represent something.
“America was different.
America was a river, roaring
along, unmindful of the past.
PAKISTAN AND ISRAEL
We listened to the call to
prayer watched the
building’s hundreds of
lights come on as
daylight faded.
Islamabad:
The architecture
was more elegant too,
more modern and I
saw parks where
roses and jasmine
bloomed in the
shadows of trees.
I see Him here in the
eyes of the people in
this corridor of
desperation. This is the
real house of God….

10. AFGHANISTAN
Afghanistan
„What is Afghanistan‟ to
Amir?
How does he reflect on
Afghanistan when he first
moves to America?
What changes in his
perception of Afghanistan
when he visits it again
towards the end of the
novel?

11. The trek between Kabul and Jalalabad, a bonejarring ride down a teetering pass snaking through
the rocks, had become a relic now, a relic of two
wars. Twenty years earlier, I had seen some of the first
war with my own eyes. Grim reminders of it were
strewn along the road: burned carcasses of old
Soviet tanks, overturned military trucks gone to rust, a
crushed Russian jeep that had plunged over the
mountainside. The second war, I had watched on
my TV screen. And now I was seeing it through Farid's
eyes. (20.2)
Ask him where his
shame is.
RUSSIA
I overheard him telling Baba how he and his brother
knew the Russian and Afghan soldiers who worked
the checkpoints, how they had set up a "mutually
profitable" arrangement. This was no dream. As if on
cue, a MiG suddenly screamed past overhead.
Karim tossed his cigarette and produced a handgun
from his waist. Pointing it to the sky and making
shooting gestures, he spat and cursed at the MiG.
The end, the official end, would
come first in April 1978 with the
communist coup d'état, and
then in December 1979, when
Russian tanks would roll into the
very same streets where Hassan
and I played, bringing the death
of the Afghanistan I knew and
marking the start of a still
ongoing era of bloodletting. (5.5)

12. "In Afghanistan, owning anything American,
especially if it wasn't seconhand, was a sign
of wealth." (69)
"Baba dropped the stack of food
stamps on her desk. "Thank you, but I
don't want," Baba said. "I work always.
In Afghanistan, I work, in America I
work."" (1
San Francisco: the place I
now called home.
AMERICA
For me, America
was a place to
bury my
memories.
For Baba, a
place to
mourn his.
I overheard him telling Baba how he and his brother
knew the Russian and Afghan soldiers who worked
the checkpoints, how they had set up a "mutually
The
profitable" arrangement. This was no dream. As if on fruit was never sweet enough, the water
cue, a MiG suddenly screamed past overhead. never clean enough, and where were all the
trees and open fields?
Karim tossed his cigarette and produced a handgun
from his waist. Pointing it to the sky and making
shooting gestures, he spat and cursed at the MiG.

13. AMERICA AND IDENTITY
• America offers both a chance to form a new
identity – teaching, writing etc. America as a place
of freedom
• In contrast, General Taheri and Baba lose the
identity they had in Afghanistan.
• They want to keep the traditional culture alive. The
Afghan market, the General’s dislike of a ‘hazara
boy’ in the house etc

14. AMERICA
America
“For me America was a
place to bury my
memories, for Baba a
place to mourn his”
In what way do Amir and
Baba view America
differently?
How does moving to
America alter their
relationship?

15. PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN
• Formally in Afghanistan/India.
• Became part of India with the British rule.
• Eventually this part of India became Pakistan.
• The front line for refugees/terrorist training.
• Shifting borders/identity

16. CLOSE ANALYSIS
• Choose an extract from the novel and analyse the use of setting/place
• Possible extracts
• P4, 5, 24, 104, 109, 182, 190, 213, 228
• If you have chosen an extract in an earlier chapter of Afghanistan, compare
it to later chapters.
• Who describes the setting? Is it symbolic? Linked to a particular character?
Description? Imagery? Mood?