Quotessence
Home / Authors / Khaled Hosseini
Khaled Hosseini

Khaled Hosseini Quotes

Novelist

Filter quotes by topic

AllAfghanistanPeopleIfsKitesStoriesThinkingKnowsWarWayWritingRunnersBookChildrenYearsHas BeensMenSaidWorldAfghanKabul

Famous Khaled Hosseini Quotes

“Maybe this is necessary. Maybe there will be hope when Bush's bombs stop falling. But she cannot bring herself to say it, not when what happened to Babi and Mammy is happening to someone now in Afghanistan, not when some unsuspecting girl or boy back home has just been orphaned by a rocket as she was. Laila cannot bring herself to say it. It's hard to rejoice. It seems hypocritical, perverse.”

WarEmpathyHypocrisyAfghanistanBombingOrphanAfghanistan War
Book:A Thousand Splendid Suns
Create image

“war. Or, rather, wars. Not one, not two, but many wars, both big and small, just and unjust, wars with shifting casts of supposed heroes and villains, each new hero making one increasingly nostalgic for the old villain. The names changed, as did the faces, and I spit on them equally for all the petty feuds, the snipers, the land mines, bombing raids, the rockets, the looting and raping and killing.”

WarJusticeAfghanistanHeroesKabul
Book:And the Mountains Echoed
Create image

“That summer, Titanic fever gripped Kabul. People smuggled pirated copies of the film from Pakistan- sometimes in their underwear. After curfew, everyone locked their doors, turned out the lights, turned down the volume, and reaped tears for Jack and Rose and the passengers of the doomed ship. If there was electrical power, Mariam, Laila, and the children watched it too. A dozen times or more, they unearthed the TV from behind the tool-shed, late at night, with the lights out and quilts pinned over the windows. At the Kabul River, vendors moved into the parched riverbed. Soon, from the river's sunbaked hollows, it was possible to buy Titanic carpets, and Titanic cloth, from bolts arranged in wheelbarrows. There was Titanic deodorant, Titanic toothpaste, Titanic perfume, Titanic pakora, even Titanic burqas. A particularly persistent beggar began calling himself "Titanic Beggar." "Titanic City" was born. It's the song, they said. No, the sea. The luxury. The ship. It's the sex, they whispered. Leo, said Aziza sheepishly. It's all about Leo. "Everybody wants Jack," Laila said to Mariam. "That's what it is. Everybody wants Jack to rescue them from disaster. But there is no Jack. Jack is not coming back. Jack is dead.”

WarMiseryHeroism
Book:A Thousand Splendid Suns
Create image

“I blinked and the smile was gone. But it had been there. I had seen it. “Do you want me to run that kite for you?” His Adam’s apple rose and fell as he swallowed. The wind lifted his hair. I thought I saw him nod. “For you, a thousand times over,” I heard myself say. Then I turned and ran. It was only a smile, nothing more. It didn’t make everything all right. It didn’t make anything all right. Only a smile. A tiny thing. A leaf in the woods, shaking in the wake of a startled bird’s flight. But I’ll take it. With open arms. Because when spring comes, it melts the snow one flake at a time, and maybe I just witnessed the first flake melting. I ran. A grown man running with a swarm of screaming children. But I didn’t care. I ran with the wind blowing in my face, and a smile as wide as the Valley of Panjsher on my lips. I ran.”

LoveWarAffectionChild
Author:Khaled Hosseini
Create image

“When I went to Afghanistan in 2003, I walked into a war zone. Entire neighborhoods had been demolished. There were an overwhelming number of widows and orphans and people who had been physically and emotionally damaged; every 10-year-old kid on the street knew how to dismantle a Kalashnikov in under a minute. I would flip through math textbooks intended for third grade, fourth grade, and they would include word problems such as, "If you have 100 grenades and 20 mujahideen, how many grenades per mujahideen do you get?" War has infiltrated every facet of life.”

PeopleIfsYearsWarProblemKidsNumbersStreetsMinutesThirdsMathGradesZoneNeighborhoodOverwhelmingAfghanistanFourthFlipWidowsOrphanTextbooksFacetsGrenadeThird GradeFourth GradeWar ZonesWidows And OrphansMujahideenKalashnikov
Author:Khaled Hosseini
Create image

“The warlords took part in atrocities during the civil war in Afghanistan. They looted, they raped, they killed. They have become incredibly empowered and entrenched. They live in mansions, they have jobs in the government, and they're incredibly powerful. In Kabul, people don't want to speak about it too publicly, because these people are essentially like Tony Soprano.”

PeopleWantWarGovernmentJobsSpeakPowerfulCivil WarAfghanistanEmpoweredAtrocitiesMansionsSopranosKabulWarlordsDuring The Civil War
Author:Khaled Hosseini
Create image

“[Barack Obama] is sending more troops [to Afghanistan], but they have also realized that we are not going to win that war through guns and tanks. We have to engage the neighbors, and it is good that there is a non-military strategy in addition to a military strategy. It is, at least, encouraging. Whether it will work or not, the jury is still put.”

StillsWarWinningMilitaryGunStrategyNeighborBarackAfghanistanTroopsTanksJuryMilitary Strategy
Author:Khaled Hosseini
Create image

“‎I know you're still young but I want you to understand and learn this now. Marriage can wait, education cannot. You're a very very bright girl. Truly you are. You can be anything you want Laila. I know this about you. And I also know that when this war is over Afghanistan is going to need you as much as its men maybe even more. Because a society has no chance of success if its women are uneducated Laila. No chance.”

IfsKnowsMenWantNeedsStillsWarYoungGirlWaitingChanceThousandSmartAfghanistanI Want YouYoung WomenSplendidNeed YouUneducatedAfghan
Book:The Complete Khaled Hosseini: Digital box set
Create image