Making a Difference 

(Spoilers: I have read the whole book!) 

     In the book The Help by Kathryn Stockett, the character Skeeter is a very important one. She is white in her early twenties living in Jackson, Mississippi. She has grown up with a maid her whole life and has never treated her maids like most of the white woman in this city do. Her friend, Hilly Holbrook, is a great example of how mistreated the maids are. She had started "The Home Help Sanitation Initiative" which called for each home having a separate bathroom for the help because she believed that these woman carried diseases that could be very harmful to white families. 

Skeeter from the Help, with a line from the movie as well as the book regarding Hilly's bathroom initiative. 
(http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/the-help-skeeter/images/32260170/title/tell-er-skeeter-photo)

     I admire Skeeter because she refuses to publish Hilly's initiative. There is no doubt that every white woman in Jackson adores Hilly and go along with everything she says. There is never any arguing with Hilly or her opinions. Despite the way Hilly feels about the help, Skeeter has never felt this way, especially about her maid as she was growing up, Constantine. 

As the book goes on, Skeeter gets a job writing cleaning articles for a newspaper as Ms. Myrna. Skeeter goes to her best friend, Elizabeth Leefolt's, maid, Aibileen. As she continues to meet with Aibileen about the column, she comes up with the idea to write a book about what it's like for the colored maids working for white families in Jackson. At first, Aibileen and the other maids including her best friend, Minny, are very reluctant to tell Skeeter their stories. They believe she is just like all the other white women and thinks she just wants to get them in trouble. The amount of danger all of them face telling their stories to Skeeter is enough to scare them away. Eventually she gets more than a dozen maids to tell their stories and the book ends up being published.


The book becomes nationwide news and it is hard to believe that Skeeter's idea actually led to something so important. She wanted to write this book for completely selfless reasons. She wanted the people in the country to understand how wrong it is to treat their help like they do, although some of the stories told were of how they were treated well. Skeeter did not just do it for the money, because she paid all the maids with the money that she had made from the book.

I find Skeeter a truly inspiring character because she does not just sit back and watch these maids being treated horribly and do nothing about it like everyone else. She takes initiative for a cause that she believes strongly in, despite the amount of danger that she could face if the people of Jackson actually find out that the book was really about their city, which they eventually do. 

The Kite Runner: Societal Impact on Literature

     The literature of each time period is definitely impacted a lot by society. Authors and publishers always have to keep in mind what society will be interested in so that they can make as much money as possible. In our time period, kids and teenagers are getting less and less interested in literature and authors must work a lot harder in order to write novels that will interest today’s youth. It is not necessarily easy to predict what books will sell. Some people like more realistic books and some people like fantasy books. Sometimes it is a shot in the dark whether society will show interest in a novel or not. http://www.preservearticles.com/201103284772/literature-and-society.html In this article,  literature is described as the mirror of society. Our society has a direct impact on literature and our society is always changing, therefore so is our literature.

     Many people become interested in books when they can find one that they personally relate to. If a novel has a plot or characters that are similar to them or experiences they have, they will be more likely to read it and be very interested in it.

     The Kite Runner became a best seller in the United States and was a number one New York Times best seller for more than 2 years according to http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Kite_Runner. This novel had a strong influence on society. My belief is that the reason it had such a large impact is because the author, Khaled Hosseini, did such a good job telling Amir's story and making the reader really connect with what went on in his life. It makes us realize how much differently people in other countries live. Persepolis is also a good example of this too because we learn all the things Marji had to deal with because of the revolution going on in her country.

     These novels were both very popular and reflect how literature changes due to our society. They are both very realistic and that helps connect the reader to the novels.

The Kite Runner: Coping with Uncontrollable Forces

The character Hassan in the Kite Runner has to go through many experiences that are out of his control and must adjust to deal with them. Amir and Baba were forced out of Afghanistan because it had become a war zone. They ended up moving to California where there lives changed completely. After living here for a while, Baba became very sick and eventually passes away. His father's death takes a huge toll on Amir. Baba was the only person that Amir had in his life after they had to leave Afghanistan. Although Amir and his father did not have the closest relationship as he was growing up, there is no doubt that he had a huge admiration and respect for his father. Losing anyone in your life is a hard thing to deal with and is something we have no control over.

Amir and his father, Baba

(http://www.hollywoodjesus.com/movieDetail.cfm/i/810BB061-C037-4183-6EB7B5E1D0B1BCCB)

One day, Amir receives a phone call from his father's old friend Rahim. Rahim updates Amir about everything that has been happening in Afghanistan. He asks Amir to come visit him in Afghanistan where he tells Amir about Hassan and he learns that since he left, his old friend has gotten married, had a child and unfortunately been killed. This is news that Amir takes very harshly because it makes him think of their childhood together. Amir and Hassan grew up together and even though they had grown apart after all the experiences they went through, Amir is still devastated by this news. On top of this, he learns that before Hassan and his wife passed away they had a child who is now in an orphanage and is in need of a parent. Amir isn't sure about taking his child in which I don't really understand because he and his wife, Soraya, had been trying to have a baby.

 

 However, this is not all the news Rahim Khan has. He also suggests the Hassan’s father, Ali, and his wife, Sanaubar, were not able to have children and that Hassan was actually Baba’s child. This would mean that the entire time Amir and Hassan grew up together, they were actually half-brothers and didn’t even know it. This makes Amir more apt to consider adopting the child because that would make him Amir’s nephew.

Unfortunately for Amir, this is not even all of the bad news. Rahim Khan, the man he has looked up to for so long, is ill as well and says that he will not make it through the summer. This takes a toll on Amir because Rahim has been like a father to him for his whole life. He treated him like a father should treat a son and encourage his dreams rather than be embarrassed of them, like Baba sometimes was.

Amir and Rahim Khan

(http://wodumedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Zekiria-Ebrahimi-as-young-Amir-and-Shaun-Toub-as-Rahim-Khan-star-in-Marc-Forsters-The-Kite-Runner.-Photo-by-Phil-Bray.-Copyright-Motion-Picture-Artwork-Photos-2007-DREAMWORKS-LLC-and-KITE-RUNNER-HOLDINGS-LLC.-All-Right-20-960x640.jpg)

 

 

This is a lot of bad information that Amir receives in a very short amount of time. All of these things are out of his control and he has already lost two people he had been close to for a long time and now he knows that he will lose Rahim Khan as well. Baba, Hassan and Rahim were the people that Amir was the closest to in his life and now he is forced to cope with these tragedies.