109 AMIR’S GUILT IN KHALED HOSSEINI’S THE KITE RUNNER Lambe’, L.G.L. 1 and Basuki, R. 2 1,2 English Department, Faculty of Letters, Petra Christian University, Siwalankerto 121-131, Surabaya 60236, East Java, INDONESIA E-mails: m11409036@john.petra.ac.id; rbasuki@peter.petra.ac.id ABSTRACT This paper emphasizes guilt as the main issue portrayed in Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner through its main character, Amir. Guilt discussed in this paper is defined as a feeling produced from a behavior that is related to a failure, a wrong doing, or even a sin. This paper discusses the way Amir deals with his guilt since it needs to be redeemed even through suffering. In this paper, I maintain that Amir bears not only his personal guilt yet also his familial and societal guilt. Amir’s personal guilt comes from his failure to become a good friend, his familial guilt comes from his burden to bear the sin of the family, especially his father, and his societal guilt comes from his burden to bear the injustice that happened in the history of his tribe. The analysis also shows that self-sacrifice is the way Amir chooses to deal with his guilt. Keywords: Guilt, personal, familial, societal, sacrifice INTRODUCTION The Kite Runner is Khaled Hosseini’s first novel and also the first Afghanistan novel written in English. Through the issues shown in this novel, he feels compellled to tell the world something of the life he had known before his country was consumed by war and dictatorship (Academy of Achievement, 2008, September). The setting of The Kite Runner is divided into two by following the life of its main character. First is Amir’s childhood in 1970’s when Afghanistan was under the occupation of Soviet Union; when it was changed from a Monarchy into a Republic. Second is Amir’s adulthood when Afghanistan was under the Taliban dictatorship. The Kite Runner tells a story about friendship between Amir, who is a member of a Pashtun the rulling tribe in Afghanistan, and Hassan, who is a Hazara the minority tribe in Afghanistan. Hassan who considers Amir as a true friend puts everything in this friendship while Amir is still confused whether Hassan is his friend or a servant to him. The story of friendship filled with betrayal that will lead to the guilty feeling interests me in discussing this novel. In this paper, I am interested in discussing what guilt Amir feels and how he deals with them. I wish to show that Amir’s guilt is not only personal yet has become the familial and societal guilt. I also want to discuss that self-sacrificing is the way Amir deals with his guilt. To be able to find the answer, I will use the general concept of guilt, to discuss Amir’s personal and familial guilt, according to the Handbook of Emotion which is “guilt produced when individuals evaluate their behavior as failure but focus on the specific features or actions of the self that led to the failure” (Lewis, Michael, Jones, 2008). The focus is the actions and behaviors of a person which create failures that later produce the guilty feelings. Lewis also mentions that a person with guilt will take ”corrective action” in order to “repair the failure” (Ibid). A person with guilty feeling will try to make things right with what he/she has done wrong. I will also use the concept of Guilt- Purification-Redemption given by Kenneth Burke: Living in a society offers a complete set of values in which people can find themselves and measure success and failure, or good and evil yet people are incapable in keeping all the commandments so the result is “broken laws, concomitant guilt, and a need of purgation” (Kuypers, 2008, p. 168). I will use this to discuss Amir’s societal guilt. Burke emphasis on suffering through mortification by offering oneself as a victim and suffering or what Burke called as “self-victimage resulted a transformation and symbolic rebirth”(Kuypers, 2008, p. 180). This concept will be used to discuss the way Amir deals with his guilt. AMIR'S GUILT AND THE WAY HE DEALS WITH THEM In this paper, I planned to discuss Amir's guilt in his friendship with Hassan. It arouse when he was still in Afghanistan. Although later Amir and his father moved to America, the guilty feelings remain in him. His guilt is strengthened by the fact that he found out from his father closest friend, Rahim Khan, about his ‘true’ relationship with Hassan that will lead Amir to realize