Summary: : In chapter twenty-seven of A Thousand Splendid Suns, Laila awakes in the care of Mariam in Rasheed’s house. A rocket that struck her house had missed Laila and she was in bad condition. Laila got better slowly, but she still felt grief and was guilt racked for her parents’ deaths. Then, one morning, a man came to see Laila. He was a conveyor of news and brought news of Tariq’s death. Laila had loved Tariq and this man, Abdul Sharif, brought news of his death from Peshawar. Abdul said Tariq had died from wounds he suffered from a rocket strike, and that his last wish was that Abdul should come to tell Laila the news.
In chapters twenty nine and thirty, Rasheed began to be very nice to Laila, and talked about what would please her, and Mariam saw what was truly happening, a courtship. Rasheed justified his courtship, and Mariam begged for him not to marry Laila. Rasheed displays the lowly status of women and justifies his marrying Laila as saving her from life on the streets. Laila agrees to marry Rasheed, and Rasheed gives her what he had once given to Mariam, thus ignoring her. Laila agreed to the marriage because she was pregnant, and changed her decision to run away for the sake of her future baby. Rasheed and Laila married and then consummated the marriage.
Analysis: These chapters are very important to the plot of the story. The plot in part one, involving Mariam, meets the plot of part two involving Laila in these chapters. Essentially, chapter 27 is Laila’s story meeting that of Mariam, which paves the way for the rest of te story to be told. In addition, these chapters include the mysterious messenger of Tariq’s death, which is crucial later on. The news drives Laila to such grief that she marries Rasheed later on. These chapters are vital to the plot and include much of the idea of suffering and loss that the author is trying to communicate.
The main importance of chapters twenty nine and thirty is the treatment of women in Afghanistan at this time. The fact that Rasheed was trying to marry a second wife shows the low esteem in which women were held. They had little freedoms, and were killed for being deceitful, so Laila agreed to marry Rasheed out of fear that the affair between her and Tariq would be revealed. These chapters also show the limited freedoms that women had. Laila had to save money to run away, as she was treated so badly, because she was not allowed to get a divorce. The treatment of women in Afghanistan is one of the main points of the novel and these chapters
