Imagine hanging on to consciousness by a thin string but still summoning enough energy and courage to save your friend. Imagine becoming a murderer for the greater good, but still being punished for the act. In part three of a Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, the plot is evolving. With a bang Rasheed asks for Laila’s hand in marriage and Mariam is not happy. Since Mariam doesn’t get a say in Rasheed’s actions she turns cold toward the young girl. Then tensions boil until there is a you-stole–my-husband-I-want-him-back ☺ kind of argument between Mariam and Laila. The hatred simmers down while Laila is pregnant with, not Rasheed’s baby, but her friend Tariq’s child. Laila concocts a master plan to steal small amounts of money from …show more content…
However the written words of Hosseini suggest Mariam was scared for her so that begs the question, is Mariam protective over Laila: “What of it? She’s too young, you think? She’s fourteen”(Hosseini 214). Mariam doesn’t have the courage to stand up to Rasheed one hundred percent but she strongly hints to him. She is trying her best to convince him she has everything under control at the house so Laila is not needed and there is no reason for him to marry Laila. Mariam plays the jealous wife to feed Rasheed’s ego. She is smart in making him think that she needs him. Another question that often came up is why does Mariam make Aziza clothes when she is first born? Again if the reader looks at face value the answer would be simple; Aziza smiled at Mariam and grabbed her finger one night when no one was watching. However, if one looks further the meaning behind the clothes could be a peace offering. Mariam is tired at this point. The tension with Laila and Mariam takes energy from old Mariam and Aziza is innocent. With an abusive father, the girl doesn’t need more hatred in the house. This questioning has brought a new understanding along with the …show more content…
His words play a fascinating movie that convinces the reader they want more. Near the end of part three, Hosseini plays a heart wrenching scene in his words when Laila takes Zalmai away to recover Aziza:” Just before they turned the corner, Laila looked back and saw Mariam at the door. Mariam was wearing a white scarf over her head, a blue sweater buttoned in the front, and white cotton trousers. A crest of gray hair fallen loose over her brow. Bars of sunlight slashed across her face and shoulders. Mariam waved amiably”(Hosseini 360). Mariam didn’t wave as to say she is scared she waved in a friendly manner for reassurance. The reader can imagine a cute grandma in the doorway, waving goodbye as to say “see you soon.” Furthermore, as Mariam kneels in her final moments on earth the author captures the moment in a picture made of words:” Thousands of eyes bore down on her. In the crowded bleachers, necks were craned for the benefit of a better view. Tongues clicked. A murmuring sound rippled through the stadium when Mariam was helped down from the truck. Mariam imagined heads shaking when the loudspeaker announced her crime. But she did not look up to see whether they were shaking with disapproval or charity, with reproach of pity. Mariam blinded herself to them all”(Hosseini 369). One can imagine something like a football stadium or a coliseum. When players enter everyone shoves to get a good view.
In Part three, a shift in this isolation occurs when Laila becomes a part of her life. An epiphany occurs where Mariam starts to realize the injustices that surround her; The amount of her life wasted with Rasheed, the physical and emotional abused endured from him, and the injustices she knows Laila is about to endure.Then as she starts to bond with Laila, Mariam feels a sense of purpose; the kids look up to her as a secondary mother figure and she has Laila as a companion. So when Rasheed had the intent to kill Laila, Mariam had to act. She has taken justice into her own hands by responding to Rasheed’s physical injustice and the injustices of equality rights towards women at the hands of the Taliban. She later tells Laila that she was simply “acting like a
Essentially, Laila and Mariam protect each other from Rasheed, but they also protect the other important people in their lives when they are threatened also. Equally important, they protect others, in spite of the lack of protection from the power of oppression.
The concept of standing up for one’s self plays a key theme in the novel, Wanting Mor. The novel unfolds with an illustration of Jameela, as a timorous, obedient girl, influenced by her religious beliefs. As it states in the novel, “ ‘Don’t tell me what I am! I’ll tell you!’…My face is hot. How could I have been so careless? So disrespectful. Maybe I’m tired too” (Rukhsana 29). These statements are followed after the death of Mor and how Jameela’s father, Baba, reacts to the situation by demeaning everything including his own daughter. Jameela tries to soothe her father in the attempt to make her father relaxed by informing him he is simply fatigued. In spite of this, her father believes this to be offensive as he needs to be mollified by her young daughter, which results into Jameela believing the cause was of her own. She is also depicted as diffident because she abides to anyone regardless of her own feelings and emotions. This is illustrated through chapters’ three to nine, which begins with Baba telling Jameela that they are leaving their village to go to the picturesque city known as Kabul, regardless of Jameela’s consideration in the process. Afterwards, Jameela labours away with the multiple Khalaas, respectable term for o...
Mariam and Laila face a lot of social injustice yet they do not attempt to challenge the issues because they are told to endure all forms of pain and social injustice. From a very young age, Mariam was told by her mother that all she needed to do was to withstand any pain and suffering, it’s the one skill she needed.” Endure . . . Women like us. We endure. It’s all we have”(17). In addition, Laila also suffered the injustice of society since she was a single mother it was not safe for her to live on her own so she had no choice but to marry Rasheed. The society gave women no choice but to endure and that’s the main reason why Laila and Mariam were unable to take a stand. However, close to the end of the novel Mariam decides to take initiative and fights back. She finally takes action because she is driven by the love she has for Laila and her child since they are the only family she’s had that loved her. So when Rasheed her husband attempts to choke Laila to death, Mariam reflects on how much injustice she has faced and how unjust both her husband and the society have been towards her and other women. At this point, Mariam realizes that she must end her and Laila’s suffering once and for all. So she takes Rasheed’s life. Although Mariam is executed as a form of punishment, she is very successful at taking a stand to end the oppression and injustice. Mariam knew her actions were fatal yet she still did what she knew was right. Furthermore, she sacrificed herself and didn’t regret her action instead she was pleased that “she was leaving the world as a woman who had loved and been loved back. She was leaving it as a friend, a companion, a guardian. A mother” ( 329). Her actions freed Laila and her child from Rasheed’s abuse and helped them build a better life. Thus Mariam was successful and did not want to endure the injustice or see Laila suffer, she did it by
Both Laila, the lucky girl with breathtaking beauty, whose luck suddenly vanishes, and Mariam, the unlucky and illegitimate daughter, whose luck goes from bad to terribly worse, become dynamic and complex characters. This transformation is brought about by the gradual revealing of Hosseini’s motivation. In fact, Hoesseini is evidently motivated to reveal the truth, and let the emotional and physical realities of Afghani women’s lives be known to the
1. What is the difference between a. and a. Elizabeth from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice is bright, direct, and unapologetic. Throughout the novel she proves to have her aspirations and goals clear and will not settle for any less. She refuses proposals from men in high places who would more than likely raise her hierarchal status, simply because the men would not make her happy. Austen makes it very clear that Elizabeth sets herself apart.
Rasheed was the man in the relationship and Mariam was the typical wife that did her wifely duties and stayed home while he goes and works and provides money. He treats her as if she’s worthless and means nothing to the world. When he eats he doesn’t look at her or speak to her, he is demanding, and tells her how worthless and uneducated she is. This then leads to him becoming abusive punching her, slapping her, kicking her, speaking rudely to her, he did this to damage her. A lot of this occurs because Mariam can get have his son and she is also considered a harami. Everything she does infuriates him and blames all the issues on her. She constantly tried to avoid making mistakes and did everything to his liking, but he always found a way to abuse her and blame it on her. Rasheed did not care about anything but himself he abided by the patriarchal stereotype ,which is being the dominant one throughout society and making women inferior. Mariam felt powerless and fearful. She was a victim of abuse and oppression. She married a man that said everything he did was normal in a relationship. Even though Mariam was in a violent marriage she became a strong women and soon she overcomed these
From start to finish, one could see how much Mariam values Laila, Aziza, and their friendship. The first example is when Mariam vows to help Laila while they are in the hospital for Laila’s unborn child: “I’ll get you seen, Laila jo. I promise” (287). This simple promise is a deep portrayal of Mariam’s desire to help Laila find a doctor and deliver her baby. Additionally, one can see Mariam’s love for Laila when she protects her from Rasheed’s grip of death, “‘Rasheed.’ He looked up. Mariam swung. She hit him across the temple. The blow knocked him off Laila” (348). Rasheed was going to kill Laila, but Mariam steps in and knocks him off of her with a shovel to save her life. Mariam forms a tight-knit bond with Laila, and when Hosseini includes their relationship, one can see how Mariam values Laila enough to kill another man. The author also describes their relationship after Mariam and Laila discuss plans for leaving: “When they do, they’ll find you as guilty as me. Tariq too. I won’t have the two of you living on the run like fugitives.” … “Laila crawled to her and again put her head on Mariam’s lap. She remembered all the afternoons they’d spent together, braiding each other’s hair, Mariam listening patiently to her random thoughts and ordinary stories with an air of gratitude, with the expression of a person to whom a unique and coveted privilege had been extended” (358). The love Mariam has for
The concept of standing up for one’s self plays a key theme in the novel, Wanting Mor. The novel unfolds with an illustration of Jameela, as a timorous, obedient girl, influenced by her religious beliefs. As it states in the novel, “ ‘Don’t tell me what I am! I’ll tell you!’…My face is hot. How could I have been so careless? So disrespectful. Maybe I’m tired too” (Rukhsana 29). These statements are followed after the death of Mor and how Jameela’s father, Baba, reacts to the situation by demeaning everything including his own daughter. Jameela tries to soothe her father in the attempt to make her father relaxed by informing him he is simply fatigued. In spite of this, her father believes this to be offensive as he needs to be mollified by her young daughter, which results into Jameela believing the cause was of her own. She is also depicted as diffident because she abides to anyone regardless of her own feelings and emotions. This is illustrated through chapters’ three to nine, which begins with Baba telling Jameela that they are leaving their village to go to the picturesque city known as Kabul, regardless of Jameela’s consideration in the process. Afterwards, Jameela labours away with the multiple Khalaas, respectable term for o...
Rasheed cared for his honour and reputation so much that he did not take into consideration the action that Mariam and Laila did, if it was something he believed would bring shame to his reputation he would often physically punish them. Shortly after Mariam marries Rasheed, he says, “Where I come from, one wrong look, one improper word, and blood is spilled. Where I come from, a woman’s face is her husband’s business only. I want you to remember that. Do you understand?” (Hosseini 63). Rasheed begins to foreshadow his urge to control. Rasheed tells Mariam to start wearing a burqa from now on because he believes if she does not that is culturally wrong. Rasheed shows how honour is more important than anything. Similarly, in the documentary “Honour Killing” Shafia wanted to have complete control over his daughter's interactions. When Shafia was unable to control his daughter’s and realized that they are acting in a way that is dishonoring him he murders them. Shafia cared so much for his honor that he failed to realize that what his daughters did was socially acceptable in Canadian culture as said by their uncle. In both stories, the men saw control as a
Of course, the latter’s self-centeredness and depravity are already well-established when it becomes known that he rapes young girls, but other villagers are also guilty when they allow him to continue. In many cases, it is greed that prevents them from standing up since some know “that when he [is] finished with them, the girls would fetch a decent bride price” because of how scared and docile they become because of these incidents (296). Even if this brings money to a poor family, Freed uses the nameless girl’s story of her rape to demonstrate that no amount of trauma given to any victim is worth any material comforts. In a similarly selfish case, Grace, de Jong’s maid, is delighted to hand captured girls over to her master because “then she’d have her two weeks off” (300). Although she begins to feel a special bond with this girl in particular, the fear of de Jong and the desire to be free for two weeks outweigh that attachment, and she acquiesces to his demands. However, during the fight, Freed shows how wrong Grace is and how horrible it is that an innocent girl has to suffer from this society because people are more willing to save their own skins than to stand up, leaving the child no choice but to resort to violent means
Rasheed tries to convince Mariam that the only way to keep Laila safe is by marrying her. He ends up hiring a man named Abdul Harif to tell Laila that he had met the love of her life, Tariq, in the hospital and that he had died. Laila is told this right when she finds out that she is pregnant with Tariq’s child. Rasheed had hired Abdul Harif to tell Laila this because he wanted to get Laila to marry her. When Rasheed brings up marriage to Laila, she jumps on board right away, and falls into Rasheed’s trap. After Rasheed and Laila get married, he treats her like a queen. He becomes very protective of Laila. Almost all his attention is spent on her, and in a sense, forgets that he is even married to Mariam. But him acting affectionate and caring does not last very long. When Laila gives birth to a baby girl, named Aziza, Rasheed starts to treat Laila how he treated Mariam when she could not successfully carry a child full term. Again, Rasheed ends up not getting what he wants, and therefore he turns onto Laila. The abuse, both verbal and physical, starts to get worse in the household. A particular situation that displays just how violent the abuse in their household can get is when he locks Laila and Aziza in their room, and Mariam in the shed because they tried running away from Rasheed and the abuse. He leaves them without water or food, and it ends up almost killing Aziza. This is where Rasheed falls into the paradox of power again. “ ...the 16th century Italian philosopher Niccolo Machiavelli insisted that compassion got in the way of eminence. If a leader has to choose between being feared or being loved, Machiavelli insisted that the leader should always go with fear. Love is overrated” (Lehrer The Power Trip). Rasheed would rather have his own family be completely afraid of him and almost
She continues: “It was a deadly cycle. Dia had to understand that in her own small but tenacious way she could break it” (410). The irony of her efforts lies in the fact that Dia’s later efforts to resist fatalism in love and choose her own partner, destine her to tragedy because of others’ actions in the past, just as the citizens of Pakistan are hampered by the former actions of political leaders, both foreign and domestic, leaving few avenues, despite acts of resistance, to navigate a “happy ending.” Thus, Khan weaves the plots of mother and daughter together in her own fatalistic fashion, situating the novel within the context of a culture rooted in oppressions of gender and class, strictly governed by convention and expectation, and subject to the caprice of more powerful states, to parallel one of the warning signs she describes in the novel: “Trespassers Will Be Prosecuted.” (Trespassing
“the city where Mariam was born, in 1959, had once been the cradle of Persian culture, the home of writers, painters, and Sufis.” (Hosseini 4) Mariam’s birthplace is what created her drive to want to learn about what was happening around her. Where people are born is what shapes them to be certain of who they want to be in life. People’s surroundings are inspiration to achieve what they want. “Yes, modern Afghan women married to modern Afghan men who did not mind that their wives walked among strangers with makeup on their faces and nothing on their heads” (Hosseini 75)
War ravaged the land and tore people apart emotionally and physically. One recurrence that came about during the war was the raping and “ruining” of women. To be ruined meant that a woman was raped and/or tortured so severely that she would no longer be capable of having sex. In a culture that values the fertility of its women, this lead to the breakdown of many communities. A perfect example of this breakdown would be in the case of Salima and Fortune. Salima was taken into the bush and raped for 5 months and when she returned home her husband, Fortune, turned her away. This violence committed against Salima caused her to be forced from her community, and it also forced her to take up work at Mama Nadi’s. Here she has to endure a change of identity in order to do the work required of her and to come to terms with her past. At the end of the play, Salima dies and states the haunting words; “You will not fight your battles on my body anymore”(94). These last words sum up just how intrusive the war has become in the lives of everyone in its path and also represents a clear shift in Salima as an individual. Instead of the woman who just wanted her husband back at the end of the play, we are left to contemplate a