Having just finished The Kite Runner, parallels between it and Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, which I just finished listening to a BBC radio dramatization of, come to mind.

In The Kite Runner (2003) the reader along with the protagonist, Amir, eventually finds out that the household servant boy, Hassan, is not merely a servant of a lower class, but actually a half-brother. It turns out that his father (Baba) has led a somewhat seedy sexual life, climaxing with the impregnation of a disreputable woman, the offspring of which relationship is taken in not by the father himself (for that would be shameful and everyone would know the father had been promiscuous), but taken in by the older, male household servant (Ali) who likewise has a tainted reputation as the village idiot. The father is then able keep his illegitimate son in close proximity while keeping the scorn of having such a child at a distant. Ultimately in the novel who finds his death within the pages is the bastard and the father.

The Brother Karamazov (1880) shows similiar details. The reader finds out that it was indeed a Karamazov who killed their father, Fyodor Pavlovich, though none of the known brothers, but the half-brother who was born of licentiousness relationship between the father and a mute street woman. Smerdyakov of offspring of which relationship, like Hassan, though being a son did not enjoy the benefits thereof because of the disrepute of his birth to an ignoble woman. He was taken in rather as a servant in the household by an older, male household servant. Ultimately in the story who finds his death within the pages is the bastard (suicide) and the father (murdered).

The BBC radio dramatization has been a nice introduction to The Brothers Karamazov, but judging by what I read elsewhere on the Internet of the plot and story they cut quite a bit out. I guess I’ll have to read the book next. Amazing story. Why haven’t they done a modern cinematic version?