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Saturday, 19 July 2014

Issues of Gender Roles in South-Asian literature: Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns



Issues of Gender Roles in South-Asian literature: Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns

           Khaled Hosseini (1965) first started his career by dealing Persian Poetry. He has also cited a Farsi translation of Jack London’s White Fang as a key influence on his youthful imagination, as well as Persian translations of novels ranging from Alice in Wonderland to Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer series. In his first year of school in the U.S., Khaled Hosseini struggled with English, but his encounter with John Steinbeck’s Depression-era novel The Grapes of Wrath rekindled his love for literature, and he began to write stories again, this time in English. Throughout his medical studies, he continued to write short stories in his spare time. Hosseini is “very fond memories of [his] childhood” in peaceful pre-Soviet era Afghanistan, as well as his personal experiences with Afghanistan’s Hazara people led to the writing of his first novel, The Kite Runner(2003).Following the success of this book, he has returned to Afghanistan for the first time in 27years and shocked to see the devastation of the war. His second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns was published in 2007in which he has focused on the tragic experiences of women in pre-war Afghanistan, during the Soviet occupation and the civil war, and under the Taliban dictatorship. This novel debuted at no.1 on The New York Times bestseller list clearly an entire year. It deals with Man’s inhumanity to man, systematic victimization of women by patriarchal institutions, Spousal abuse, Resistance to victimization, power of Education, female Education, corrupting influence of absolute power i.e, colonial rule over Afghanistan. Hosseini’s novel is an unforgettable portrait of a wounded country and a deeply moving story of family and friendship. The pain of exile, humanitarian approach, redemption and hope is the key to Hosseini’s style.
          In this thesis, I will examine the issues of Gender inequality and destruction of war in Afghanistan- socio-political scenario. The story of the female characters runs parallel to the story of Afghanistan as the novel stretches over four decades. I will specifically focus on the plight of two characters: Mariam and Laila keeping in view the treatment of their husband and society with them and their resistance against these societal pressures. I will ask: whether the women in South-Asian regions are completely suppressed or they have share roles of gender to survive in a patriarchal society.
Hosseini works hard to illustrate the miserable life of Mariam and Laila through serf-like treatment and their subjection to physical and emotional brutality that was allowed, enabled and endorsed. They lived in Afghanistan during Afghan's tumultuous thirty-year transition from Soviet occupation to Taliban control and post-Taliban rebuilding. A Thousand Splendid Sunsdescribes how the patriarchal system of Afghan society has resulted out the fact that there are a lot of women's rights were diminished. In doing so, he makes common cause with writers of the same period (Roy, Ali, Shamsie, Lahiri), who discuss the patriarchal system having advantage of the Postcolonial Feministic theory. Of particular interest in this connection is Roy's The God of Small Things (1997), which gives rise to the patriarchal perspective of feminism in the light of the physical, psychological and economical violence against women. By tracing the reception of such feministic agenda in India, I hope to set Hosseini's work in reflection to widespread public interest in South-Asian literature.
        The post-colonial feministic treatment of Hosseini's work emphasizes on the need of examining Gender roles in war like chaotic situation of Afghanistan. The ultimate power Mariam has in A Thousand Splendid Suns is achieved through the gender solidarity she creates with Laila. Secondary essays will help me to assess whether style was associated strongly with gender or topic.
         A significant focus of my investigation will illustrate Hosseini's association with his native land was the result of his joining UNHCR for helping refugees. He has adopted meaningful experiences of life through U.N. Refugee Agency. His inspiration of Persian poetry leads him to this marvelous success of A Thousand Splendid Suns whose title is borrowed from a 17th century poem of Saib-e-Tabrizi about 'Kabul', and his citation of Afghan singer Ahmed Zahiris the basic source of his seminal memories during his stay in Afghanistan. I will continue to trace the circles of reader not only in South-Asian region but also in European regime as well.
          Finally, Khaled Hosseini's social critique in his depiction of Afghan women and society must be examined in relation to the larger debates over the proper role and position of women in Afghan especially in South-Asian society. Primarily examined through his influences of Persian poets-Hafez, Zahir and SaibTabrizi, his Persian translations and John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrathand secondary literature, I will characterize the 'Post-colonial feministic theory' of the time, evaluating its coherence compositions, tenets, impact and activity.
          As a whole, this thesis will weave together themes of gender differences, social class conflicts, religious extremism, female education, domestic abuse, foreigner invasion, socio-political activism and Resistance as a facet to argue the significance of A Thousand Splendid Suns in modern South-Asian literature and to capture the interplay between culture(s) and text(s).






                                                              BIBLIOGRAPHY

·         Hosseini, Khakled (2007).A Thousand Splendid Suns. New York: ATTS Publications LLC.
·         Roy, Arundati (1997). The God of Small Things.
·         Shamsie, Kamila(2009).Burnt Shadows.
·         Ali, Monica(2003).Bricklane.
·         Namita Singh (2013). Feminism v/s Gender equity: Socio-Political Activism in Khaled Hosseini'sA Thousand Splendid Suns.Inter. J. Educat. Res. Technol., Vol 4 [2]: 88-92
·         Sthur, Rebecca. "A Thousand Splendid Suns: Sanctuary and Resistance." Critical Insights: Cultural Encounters. Ed. Nicholas Birns. Ipswich, MA: Salem Press, 2013.

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