_____seller of Kabul

Has anyone else noticed the irony of the back cover's synopsis?

"This mesmerizing portrait of a proud man who, through three decades and successive repressive regimes, heroically braved persecution..."

To me, at least, that statement seems incongruous with Seierstad's tone regarding gender equality. Although she does describe Sultan's love of books in a voice that recognizes a fellow lover of literature in Khan, she is not entirely objective towards him throughout the rest of the book.

She is selective with the emotions she chooses the characters to express.

Those at a disadvantage, such as Leila and Aimal, have the sympathy vote (Seierstad has that entire speech about Leila and dust, and Aimal and his bleeding heart)

Mansur and Eqbal are the rude, callous, rebellious teenagers that don't exactly endear themselves to the reader. Sultan's arrogance, avarice and selfishness don't win him any friends either.

These are generalizations, and there are facets to each character that can sometimes be contradictory to my depictions of them, but these are my general impressions - I'd love to hear someone else's thoughts, it would make for a very interesting discussion.

Has anyone else noticed how the landscapes/surroundings of the characters, in all different parts of the book, reflect their natures and personalities, and the Afghan culture as a whole? Seierstad's descriptions are sometimes so alien to our own personal perceptive ability that she seems to create a parallel world using verisimilitude - it is the small things she mentions that allow us to engage with the story: Aimal's Snickers and Bounty Bars makes the empty, bombed-out pool and tumbledown hotel a bit less remote.

Ending on a rhetorical note, Seierstad's exceptional use of detail is both an attempt to establish ethos and a narrative device: she is both trying to establish her authority on the subject as a witness to Afghani life, and she is trying to paint a portrait, and so she describes people, places and events in excruciating detail - she writes down all of the components of the wedding feast and their amount, in pounds.

She makes a bid to appeal to the reader's sympathy by emphasizing the hopelessness in Leila's case - while it may not be intentional (since it happened), she spends a good chunk of time expounding on Leila's psychological state regarding the marriage proposal and her situation at home, building up the suspense so that the 'let-down' has a greater emotional impact on the reader.

Fill in the blank at the top of the post if you wish to - what do you think is being sold to us, the reader? What is Seierstad trying to make us buy (into)?