Essay The Kite Runner and To Kill a Mockingbird Comparison

In both The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, literacy and education play a key role. The education of a man gives him power, and can determine his stature or influence in the community. Literacy gives a man an insight to knowledge that can be important. By developing characters with different levels of education, Khaled Hosseini and Harper Lee develop and strengthen the idea that literacy and education are dangerous tools, and can make the difference between life and death. Khaled Hosseini and Harper Lee depict literacy as both helpful and harmful. They also show how being uneducated leads to being taken advantage of. Using these ideas they strengthen the idea of educating and literacy being†¦show more content†¦One time, I took on the whole class and won. I told Baba about it later that night, but he just nodded, muttered, ‘Good’† (19). Though his reading makes him feel special, and causes his friends and Hassan to look up to him, it is still frowned upon by Baba, who would rather Amir be more adventurous, and pursue something more worthwhile than reading and writing. Khaled Hosseini does not only show the importance of literacy by explain the benefits that come with it, but also by showing what happens to those who are illiterate, like Hassan. Hassan’s illiteracy allows him to be taken advantage of, and Amir sees this at times. Once, when Amir is reading to Hassan and Hassan asks the meaning of the word â€Å"Imbecile†, Amir responds by saying â€Å"Let’s see. ‘Imbecile.’ It means smart, intelligent. I’ll use it in a sentence for you. ‘When it comes to words, Hassan is an imbecile’† (29). Though only a small example, this quote shows how Hassans inability to read gives other people power over him, Amir explores this more when he begins writing his first s tories, and reads them to Hassan in place of the other stories. Amir will later feel guilty about pulling pranks over Hassan, but never goes back to apologize. Reading becomes part of what Amir sees as the border between Pashtuns and Hazaras, because all of the Pashtuns he knows can read, and all of the Hazaras he knows cannot. Hosseini paints the picture that literacy is only good, and without it, Hazaras and other people like HassanShow MoreRelatedLiterary Criticism : The Free Encyclopedia 7351 Words   |  30 PagesTreader (for plot character Eustace Scrubb) by C. S. Lewis (1952) Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison (1952) In the Castle of My Skin, by George Lamming (1953)[31] Goodbye, Columbus, by Philip Roth (1959)[32] A Separate Peace, by John Knowles (1959) To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee (1960)[30] Dune, by Frank Herbert (1965)[33] The Outsiders, by S. E. Hinton (1967)[34] A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. Le Guin (1968)[35] I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou (1969) Bless Me, Ultima, by Rudolfo