摘 要

阿富汗裔美国作家卡勒德·胡塞尼所著的《灿烂千阳》讲述了两个阿富汗妇女的不幸故事，刻画了战争期间遭受悲惨命运的悲剧女性形象。在这部小说里， 废物书写被赋予深刻的含义，不但深化了小说主题，也体现了胡塞尼创作的艺术价值。本论文主要从战后的废墟、过时的布卡、被抛弃的女性三个方面分析了《灿烂千阳》中的废物书写。胡塞尼的废物书写不仅成功塑造了两位经典的阿富汗女性形象，也表达了作家对战争时期阿富汗女性的深刻同情与人文关怀。

关键词：《灿烂千阳》；废物书写；悲剧；阿富汗女性

Contents

1. Introduction 1
2. Demonstration 2
   1. War-ruined landscape as the representation of Afghan women’s decayed homeland 2
      1. Damaged Kabul as the symbol of a ruined home country 2
      2. Declined Gul Daman as the symbol of a ruined home village 4
   2. Outdated Burqa as the indicator of Afghan women’s daily constraints 5
      1. Heavy and dark Burqa as the symbol of the body’s prison 5
      2. Dusty and dirty Burqa as the symbol of double victimisation in war time 7
   3. Discarded Women as the victim of Afghan Patriarchal Terronism 8
      1. Mariam: a “harami” and an infertile wife 8
      2. Laila: a homeless girl and a gravida with a “harami” 9
3. Conclusion 10

Works Cited 11

Bibliography 12

“Happiness is not available”: Trash Writing and Tragedy of Afghan Women in A Thousand Splendid Suns

Introduction

Khaled Hosseini (1965-) is an Afghan American novelist and physician. Born in Kabul, Hosseini followed his father to move to Iran and France because of his father’s occupation---a diplomat for the ministry of foreign affairs. Since his mother was a high school teacher, he read a great deal of Persian poetry which influences his later career and writings. As the second novel written by Hosseini, A Thousand Splendid Suns became the number one New York Times bestseller for fifteen weeks following his bestselling 2003 debut, A Kiter Runner. By the end of the first week in the market, the novel has sold over one million copies.

The novel, centering around two women, Mariam and Laila, narrates how they support each other and become intertwined after a series of drastic events. It consists of four parts. Part one and part two, focusing on individual stories, deal with the experiences and tragedies of Mariam, and Laila before they met, while part three tells the relationship and friendship between these two women. The last part, the only part written in the present tense, records Laila's life with Tariq.

-In the novel A Thousand Splendid Suns, Hosseini succeeds in creating authentic settings to reinforce the actions and changes of the two main characters, Mariam and Laila. Coincidently, they both married the same husband, Rasheed. With the third person narrator, Hosseini took readers experiencing a typical Afghan family life, which is characterized by women’s low social status in Afghanistan. In this novel, trash writings, including war-ruined houses and dusty clothes, are recurrent images and endowed with significant meanings. The trash-related settings play an essential role in this novel that depicts women tragedy in the novel. Besides, women, often discarded when they get pregnant, become “trash” and suffer from abuse and neglect, which reveals the gender inequality in Muslim culture. In a sense, trash-related settings and “trashed” women provide this novel a special artistic flavor, which

strengthens the theme and attracts readers’ attention by the vivid description of the tragedies of Afghan women. Therefore, this thesis will study trash writings from three aspects, respectively, war-ruined landscape as the representation of Afghan women’s decayed homeland, outdated Burqa as the indicator of Afghan women’s daily constraints, and discarded women as the victim of Afghan Patriarchal Terrorism. The focus of this thesis will be built upon the analysis of how trash writings contribute greatly to the thematic concern of this novel and help strengthen the artistic merit of Hosseini’s creation.

Demonstration

• 1. War-ruined landscape as the representation of Afghan women’s decayed homeland
     1. Damaged Kabul as the symbol of a ruined home country

Kabul, the capital of Afghan, is set as the major background of A Thousand Splendid Suns. The novel abounds with descriptions of landscape of Kabul, such as streets, houses of the city. In addition, the major characters, Rasheed and Laila, both living in Kabul, not only suffer a lot in this city, but witness the changing condition of this city.