Soraya in The Kite Runner

Soraya's role

• Soraya is General and Jamila Taheri's daughter. She is from Afghanistan and a Pashtun, like Amir. She does not get on well with her father until later in the book, and gets on with her mother but finds her a little over the top in her care.
• Amir meets Soraya at the flea market which he visits every Saturday with Baba. He thinks she is beautiful, liking her instantly. For a while he sits with her and Jamila, getting to know the two.
  Amir and Soraya get married in chapter 13, however they cannot conceive a child as Soraya's parents would have liked.
• Soraya is Baba's main carer towards the end of his life. When she moves in with Amir she looks after him, mothering him completely.
• Sohrab and Soraya have a strained relationship when Amir brings him back from Afghanistan, as she had many plans for him however he is so scarred from what happened he does not speak or anything at all.

Soraya's appearance 

• "A slim-hipped beauty with velvety coal black hair..."
  A slim hipped beauty is what men typically like in a woman, so from the start Soraya is presented as a desirable character.Velvet is a very luxurious and rich fabric, whereas coal is more dirty and unappealing, so there is a lot of contrast between the two. Black is often symbolistic of darkness and can be quite sinister, possibly showing that she has a dark past (Running away with a man, dishonouring her family).
• "She had a thick black eyebrows that touched in the middle like the arched wings of a flying bird, and the hooked nose of a princess from Persia..."
  The part about a flying bird could symbolise freedom, as he sees Soraya as a way to be free of his guilt and sins. It is also a very graceful simile, again making her seem desirable. The simile comparing her to a princess infers she is of royalty, or seems that way compared to him.
• "Her eyes, walnut brown and shaded by fanned lashes..."
  The fanned lashes again makes me think of royalty, when princesses have people to fan them. It also makes her seem quite mysterious as the eyes are supposedly the 'window to the soul' however hers are shaded by the lashes, not allowing Amir to see into them clearly.
• "Hair pulled back and crowned with a tulip shaped bun"
  Again, the use of the word crowned implies royalty, and the tulip is the flower that young Persian men give to their beloved as an offering.

Key Quotes

• When Soraya tells Amir the story of why she wants to be a teacher he says:
  "I thought of how I had used my literacy to ridicule Hassan. How I had teased him about the big words he didn't know."
  This quote shows how contrasting Soraya and Amir are. Amir sees her as a good person, maybe even wants to be like her. She was to her servant what he should have been to Hassan, and he knows this. He feels regret, but also as though she could help him to change and take back what he used to be, by helping him become good now. 
• When we [the Taheris] lived in Virginia, I ran away with an Afghan man. I was eighteen at the time...rebellious...stupid, and...he was into drugs...We lived together for almost a month. [...]. Pader eventually found us. He showed up at the door and...made me come home. I was hysterical. Screaming. Saying I hated him..."
  This quote shows that Soraya is not as innocent as the reader and Amir first thought, she has made mistakes in the past and they still haunt her. I think this makes him feel better and more relateable as they have both done bad things. However, it also makes him jealous, as she has now got her secret off her chest, whereas he is still bottling his sins up.
• "It was Soraya who suggested she move in with Baba and me."
  This shows it is Soraya making the moral decision as Baba is very ill. It also shows that she does have some power in the relationship to make decisions. She comes across as very kind hearted, choosing to care for Baba rather than live with Amir and finally have a bit of freedom.
• "Their sons go out to nightclubs looking for meat and getting their girlfriends [...] I make one mistake and suddenly everyone is talking about nangs and namoos..."
  This shows that Soraya regrets what she has done but cannot seem to escape it. She knows it is unfair, that women experience double standards, and wants people to stop talking about it.
• "The General did not approve of women drinking alcohol and Soraya did not drink it in his presence"
  Soraya obviously has respect for her father, however she does disobey him in things such as drinking and in her career choice.
  
  How typical is Soraya of an Afghan woman and of an American woman?
  Soraya is not particularly a strict Afghan woman as she does do things which would be forbidden in their culture. 
• She ran away with a man when she was young, dishonouring her family by not keeping her virginity until marriage.
• She speaks to Amir a lot without permission from her father, this would be frowned upon and when the General finds out he tells Amir to stop seeing Soraya.
• She swears.
• She does not wear appropriate Afghan women's clothing, so she is not fully covered.
• She wants to get a career in teaching.
• She doesn't let her father boss her around and make all the decisions for her. She also stands up to him when he is being unfair to her.
• She makes a lot of her own decisions in her relationship with Amir.
  
  She seems a lot more typical of an American woman in these ways as she has more freedom to make her own choices than a Afghan woman would have. However, although she has a lot more freedom than most she still is not allowed to be alone with Amir during their engagement, she had no choice in marrying him and she has to go through the traditional marriage process.