Novels are like onions; not necessarily that they make people cry, but because they have layers. The analogy’s as simple as that, but the meaning behind it is deep. To put it into words, Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns is the onion, while the excerpt is one of its layer. The storyline, based on the excerpt, is more likely focused on the social inequalities, specifically the gender- and ideological-based issues, of the Afghanistan society. However, when heavily concentrated upon, one could decipher a spontaneous gist of what the excerpt’s main point, that being implicit anger or bottled-up emotions that are exhibited the victim of abuse or oppression. Why this main idea could have been derived from the text can be supported by three main reasons.
First, judging by the Afghan setting the story take place in, one could directly comprehend that the society that likely existed during this time was centered on patriarchal order. From this reason alone, one could safely assume that this would explain why women, children and even education during this time were looked down on, and for worse, neglected to the point of clandestine acts of heresy committed by the oppression women and children. This one of the reason is because oppression can lead to the oppressed having suppressed emotion which may lead to unmanaged emotional health and possible emotional breakdown.
Next is overly explicit depiction of female rights violations and sexism, especially in the excerpt. Such instances consist of Laila being beaten by her husband and the Taliban, uncovered women being whipped even in public, and the overall animosity towards women who stray from their norms. Such harsh experiences, one could definitely not avid bearing bottled-up emotions and underlying hostilities in the mentality of the abused. An example of this is Laila’s rebellious attitude towards Rasheed which was half-influenced by her husband’s beatings, while another good example is the excerpt’s last few lines, which included a sort of metaphor relating to fractures and unnoticeable tremors.
Last, the reason that also has a great influence to the main point is ideological basis of both of the previous reasons, their society’s strong belief on the religion of Islam. With its strict implementation by the Taliban, religion had become somewhat of an excuse to abusively accentuate their patriarchal dominance of the Afghan community. This ideologically-related issue was emphasized throughout the excerpt, what with the Taliban and all the punishments for all sorts of trivial religion-prohibited activities.
To sum it up, these aforementioned reasons are why the conceived main idea of A Thousand Splendid Suns is the bottling-up or holding in of anger and range by victims of abuse or oppression. This kind of emotional behaviour can be a last resort for people who don’t have opportunities to express their feelings, but just like the act of defecation, holding it in can be dangerous in the long run. Like the last few lines of the excerpt stated, “…fractures and powerful collision deep down and how sometimes all we see on the surface is a slight of tremor.”