Kite Runner is with us again

Six or so years ago, I taught The Kite Runner to three successive sets of tenth-graders, and marveled at the effect the novel had on me and on these adolescents. That age is a marvelous time for a humanities teacher, as we see callous children grow out of their self-centered cocoons and flex their world-empathic feelers. They grow into the world outside them and realize they truly have agency -- or will have agency and responsibility for human actions. Amir, the main protagonist of Kite Runner is so identifiable with those adolescents learning to take responsibility for their callous actions.

And of course we think of Kite Runner now that Afghanistan once again plunges into Taliban rule -- we particularly worry about the fate of the Hazara (news stories already cite random executions of Hazara men).

We can only wring hands and pray that the Taliban will have to adapt and tolerate more than they did before -- but I am not optimistic. I foresee more bloodshed and devolution to the warlord turf battles that preceded the earlier Taliban takeover. As Thomas Friedman glibly states about the middle-east: the moderates escape, leaving the extremists in charge. His latest column glibly hopes the mess of Afghanistan will draw in the surrounding enemies: Iran, Pakistan, China, Russia. None of those countries is a paragon of good governance or humanitarian relief. Afghans will want to get on those evacuation flights now.

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