A Study On The Personality Development In Khaled Hosseini's Novel A Thousand Splendid Suns

Khaled Hosseini(1965-),an Afghan-born American novelist,has three works so far.A Thousand Splendid Suns is the second work after his debut The Kite Runner.This novel follows a story of two protagonists,Mariam and Laila fighting against violence and war during the turbulent thirty years of Afghanistan and finally paying the cost of their life for it.Up till now,many scholars analyze the novel from various angles,such as feminism,historicism,eco-criticism and narratology,but few scholars study the novel from psycholsocial perspective.Hence,this thesis intends to adopt Erikson's theory of personality development to analyze the two protagonists' personality formation and development in the psychosocial point of view.Erikson breaks people's personality development down into eight stages,and each of stages has its own different virtues.The fifth stage,a transitional stage,is the key stage of identity in which adolescents are in face of psychosocial crisis between ego identity and identity crisis.Preceding positive personality will finish the construction of ego identity,while negative personality will suffer from identity crisis.Later on,different personalities will make an influence on the development of fates.Due to her unfortunate childhood,Mariam suffers from identity crisis when she grows to adolescence.In facing with Rasheed's oppression,she seems to be numb and negative.On the contrary,with her father's care and emphasis on education,Laila successfully develops healthy personality and constructs her own ego identity in adolescence.She grows to be more outgoing and confident and cherishes hope for the future.Both of them are forced to marry the shoemaker Rasheed in their adolescence because of the war.From then on,they are mingled together.Their relationship changes from the beginning hostility and jealousy to deep respect and love.When in facing with Rasheed's oppression,they hold totally different attitudes towards him.Later on,under the mutual influence between them,they successfully construct their ego identity and complete their personality transition and sublimation.Literature belongs to a fictional world but it is also the reflection of reality.This heart-wrenching story,undoubtedly,implies Khaled Hosseini's ideology and value orientation.In addition,the image of the two protagonists not only shows his ingenuity,but also highlights his understanding and interpretation of human nature.This paper attempts to introduce the theory of social psychology to explain and elaborate the personality development and changes of the two heroines,discussing the causes of their personality formation and development,and hoping to further grasp the theme of the novel.The study finds that childhood and adolescence play a key role in the two protagonists' personality formation and their different personalities are closely in relation to social factors like family,society and the environment in which they live.Those who produce a healthy and positive personality will tend to have better adaptability.Additionally,negative personalities are not permanent and they can be modified and influenced by positive ones.The novel A Thousand Splendid Suns shows the process of individuals' personality development and its influential factors,which has a positive guiding significance in the construction and development of individuals' personality and it can appropriately guide children's education in their growing.