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Sara: My Whole Life Was a Struggle
The bitter struggle of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, against the Turkish state has delivered inspirational but often tragic stories. This memoir by Kurdish revolutionary Sakine Cansiz is one of them. Sakine, whose code name was 'Sara', co-founded the PKK in 1974 and dedicated her life to its cause. On the 9 January 2013 she was assassinated in Paris in circumstances that remain officially unresolved.
This is the first chapter of her iconic life, leading up to her arrest in 1979, penned as dramatic events unfolded against the backdrop of the Turkish revolutionary left. She writes about the excitement of entering the movement as a young woman, discovering she would have to challenge traditional gender roles as she rose amongst its ranks. She was one of the first to demand the recruitment and education of female revolutionaries, and demanded total gender equality within the PKK, which is now one of its central tenets.
Today, 'Sara' is an inspiration to women fighting for liberation across the world. This is her story in her own words, and is in turns shocking, violent and path-breaking.
Translated by Janet Biehl.
This is the first chapter of her iconic life, leading up to her arrest in 1979, penned as dramatic events unfolded against the backdrop of the Turkish revolutionary left. She writes about the excitement of entering the movement as a young woman, discovering she would have to challenge traditional gender roles as she rose amongst its ranks. She was one of the first to demand the recruitment and education of female revolutionaries, and demanded total gender equality within the PKK, which is now one of its central tenets.
Today, 'Sara' is an inspiration to women fighting for liberation across the world. This is her story in her own words, and is in turns shocking, violent and path-breaking.
Translated by Janet Biehl.
344 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 20, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
August 5, 2019
Sakine Cansiz writes:
Of course it was nonsensical to think one could find the best alternative among the established parties and to place one’s hopes on a politician who represented the state. Unable to distinguish between the revolutionary left, which opposes the state, and the Kemalist left, which is loyal to the state, the Ecevit constituency tried to have it both ways. It was a further form of alienation from the self.
*
Challenging every form of injustice was a basic principal. A revolutionary personality was also energetic and creative. The first impression played a crucial role, because as yet no liberated life existed that one could point to.
*
The potential for heated confrontations was great, but the friends warned, “Don’t let yourself be provoked during discussions. Avoid insults and violence. They’ll just distract from the content of the discussion. Stay on topic and argue knowledgeably.”
*
To be sure, the participants differed on important subjects like social chauvinism, socialism, the revolution, and colonialism, but the very existence of an opposition gave all of us hope. Class struggle was a strange thing: it couldn’t be carried out by good intentions alone. If only this mass of humanity could be organized under a unified leadership! I thought. But the left was fragmented, as various factions accused each other of opportunism, or reformism, or even of holding a counterrevolutionary positon.
*
It was an unavoidable part of the struggle that comrades would be wounded, die, or end up in prison. But I couldn’t stand it if someone had even a bloody nose. Just the thought of death or a wound in a friend was hard for me. A lot of the friends said, “Calm down. Nothing’s happened to us yet! There’ll be moments when we’ll have to fight alongside the corpses of comrades. We’ll take their weapons and carry on.
I didn’t contradict them. This aspect of the struggle was indeed unavoidable. A revolutionary had to be ready to pay a high price. But it was one thing to be ready for anything and another to feel pain. Was it possible to feel great joy at achieving a goal without admitting deep pain at the losses? When a person loves, one inevitably feels great emotions. Isn’t that the meaning of love and connectedness? How can a wealth of intense feelings be separated? Some intense feelings induce us to fight, while others obstruct success. The nature of class struggle can’t be changed. Everything and everyone there is involved in the war. Hatred of the class enemy surely doesn’t demand a bloodbath. Yet in the struggle for a free future humanity, human losses are unavoidable.
Impressed by these events, I scrutinized myself and came to the conclusion that one must be able to endure difficult situations and pain, without considering them as normal. What kind of pain makes us stronger, and what kind weakens and immobilizes us? That was the crux of the matter. But this insight didn’t change my emotionality. After all, theoretical answers weren’t enough.
Of course it was nonsensical to think one could find the best alternative among the established parties and to place one’s hopes on a politician who represented the state. Unable to distinguish between the revolutionary left, which opposes the state, and the Kemalist left, which is loyal to the state, the Ecevit constituency tried to have it both ways. It was a further form of alienation from the self.
*
Challenging every form of injustice was a basic principal. A revolutionary personality was also energetic and creative. The first impression played a crucial role, because as yet no liberated life existed that one could point to.
*
The potential for heated confrontations was great, but the friends warned, “Don’t let yourself be provoked during discussions. Avoid insults and violence. They’ll just distract from the content of the discussion. Stay on topic and argue knowledgeably.”
*
To be sure, the participants differed on important subjects like social chauvinism, socialism, the revolution, and colonialism, but the very existence of an opposition gave all of us hope. Class struggle was a strange thing: it couldn’t be carried out by good intentions alone. If only this mass of humanity could be organized under a unified leadership! I thought. But the left was fragmented, as various factions accused each other of opportunism, or reformism, or even of holding a counterrevolutionary positon.
*
It was an unavoidable part of the struggle that comrades would be wounded, die, or end up in prison. But I couldn’t stand it if someone had even a bloody nose. Just the thought of death or a wound in a friend was hard for me. A lot of the friends said, “Calm down. Nothing’s happened to us yet! There’ll be moments when we’ll have to fight alongside the corpses of comrades. We’ll take their weapons and carry on.
I didn’t contradict them. This aspect of the struggle was indeed unavoidable. A revolutionary had to be ready to pay a high price. But it was one thing to be ready for anything and another to feel pain. Was it possible to feel great joy at achieving a goal without admitting deep pain at the losses? When a person loves, one inevitably feels great emotions. Isn’t that the meaning of love and connectedness? How can a wealth of intense feelings be separated? Some intense feelings induce us to fight, while others obstruct success. The nature of class struggle can’t be changed. Everything and everyone there is involved in the war. Hatred of the class enemy surely doesn’t demand a bloodbath. Yet in the struggle for a free future humanity, human losses are unavoidable.
Impressed by these events, I scrutinized myself and came to the conclusion that one must be able to endure difficult situations and pain, without considering them as normal. What kind of pain makes us stronger, and what kind weakens and immobilizes us? That was the crux of the matter. But this insight didn’t change my emotionality. After all, theoretical answers weren’t enough.
June 20, 2020
No longer using this website, but I'm leaving up old reviews. Fuck Jeff Bezos. Find me on LibraryThing: https://www.librarything.com/profile/...
Sakine Cansiz struggles to leave a patriarchal and parochial life to become a leftist revolutionary in a small town beset with Turkish nationalism, both from fascists and supposedly revolutionary social chauvinists.
I didn't love this book because its focus pulled in three directions: One direction was a series of tales of organizing daring strikes, escapes, and assassinations which kept me glued to the pages. Another was the personal life and marriage frustrations of Sakine herself which I am also willing to read. And a third which consisted of fussing over party lines, meeting etiquette, and slogan chanting minutiae which was frustrating to read.
Sakine Cansiz struggles to leave a patriarchal and parochial life to become a leftist revolutionary in a small town beset with Turkish nationalism, both from fascists and supposedly revolutionary social chauvinists.
I didn't love this book because its focus pulled in three directions: One direction was a series of tales of organizing daring strikes, escapes, and assassinations which kept me glued to the pages. Another was the personal life and marriage frustrations of Sakine herself which I am also willing to read. And a third which consisted of fussing over party lines, meeting etiquette, and slogan chanting minutiae which was frustrating to read.
February 11, 2021
This book is about Sakine Cansiz (codename Sara). She was one of the founding members of the PKK. This first part of her memoir describes her early life to her role in the formation of the pkk to her arrest. Book 2 will be about her 10 years in prison. I think there is also a third book.
Sara was involved in getting women more involved in the revolutionary world. Seeing the big role women play in the Kurdish struggle in Turkey and Syria today, it really shows how successful her actions were!
If you are interested in Kurdish history, then this book is a must. It may not be written very well (it was a translation of a translation) but it was very informative and personal.
One of my next books will be "The daughters of Kobane" which will be about women's role in Rojava (Syrian Kurdistan). It will be nice to see how much women's role in Kurdish society has changed since the late 70s.
Sara was involved in getting women more involved in the revolutionary world. Seeing the big role women play in the Kurdish struggle in Turkey and Syria today, it really shows how successful her actions were!
If you are interested in Kurdish history, then this book is a must. It may not be written very well (it was a translation of a translation) but it was very informative and personal.
One of my next books will be "The daughters of Kobane" which will be about women's role in Rojava (Syrian Kurdistan). It will be nice to see how much women's role in Kurdish society has changed since the late 70s.
January 7, 2020
Sakine Cansiz was murdered in Paris in 2013, presumably by some part of the Turkish State, this is her personal autobiography and that of the Kurdistan Workers Party, PKK. Born a Kurd in Turkey in 1958 Sara (Sakine) became involved in student politics which led her deep into the Kurdish liberation movement and the life of struggle which gives the book its title. This, the first volume, presents the reader with a detailed picture of what life was like for a Kurd, and a Kurdish woman at that, in the 1960's. Kurdish society was heavily oppressed, as it still is today, and denied freedom of identity in fascistic Kemalist Turkey. The PKK, Kurdistan Workers Party, of which Sara was a founder member, has since the 1960's revolutionized Kurdish society, especially in tackling patriarchy, to the extent that Kurdish women have taken the lead in the civil and military struggle against the chauvinist Turkish State ("Since women were the most oppressed, they also had the best prospects for becoming revolutionaries"). Sakine writes "Everywhere it was as if there could be no other life [for a woman]. Even in struggle, you had to bind yourself irrevocably to someone. No young woman could remain unattached - there were strict provisions against it. I wasn't even free of this traditional mentality myself. But a life in which revolutionary work had to accommodate the traditional family seemed to me wrong and even repugnant. It had no place in my dreams and longings." Tackling this was a long struggle but one which has become a central and inviolable tenet of the movement.
That this, certainly in the early days, was a tough and bitter struggle is conveyed clearly and with a naked honesty in these pages. The conflict was not restricted to the battle with the state, but also with the feudal relations that governed Kurdish society ("ONLY our group rejected and combated feudal relations") and with other sections of the revolutionary left in Turkey for some of whom the idea of a Kurdish identity, or need for a Kurdish liberation struggle, was as much of an anathema as it was for Turkey. The discussions and divisions of friendships, and betrayals which are all to often part of revolutionary organisation are presented here in a very human way, these are friends and former friends, and thinking people with strongly held opinions be they simply following a fundamentalist Party line, or that they have arrived at a position through what they believe to be clearly argued principles. One of the great things about this book is that it covers the period immediately before and leading up to the foundation of the PKK from a very human perspective. It presents many of the actors and their backgrounds and the conditions and situations which forged the PKK into the force which it became and remains (if today significantly metamorphosised in methodology and clearer in its practical humanistic aims).
For Sakine "What was important was the nature of the struggle and how individuals developed within it. Those who lived the way they liked, joined others voluntarily, and fought a little on the side, were not true revolutionaries. Anyone could do that. In Kurdistan, the militant struggle demanded more, and to be a Kurdistan Revolutionary was of a whole different order. Society, individuals, and classes were undergoing a process of dissolution. Contradictions and transformations were growing. First one must undergo a mental enlightenment, then embody it more and more in life. The process was tough and painful but also meaningful and beautiful."
This is an excellent biography and one which helps the reader to understand the realities of being a Kurd both at the point of the emergence of the contemporary liberation struggle in the 1960s up to today where while still short of victorious the movement has transformed Kurdish society to the point it has, in areas influenced by PKK philosophy also become a beacon for those seeking to transform society generally for the better.
That this, certainly in the early days, was a tough and bitter struggle is conveyed clearly and with a naked honesty in these pages. The conflict was not restricted to the battle with the state, but also with the feudal relations that governed Kurdish society ("ONLY our group rejected and combated feudal relations") and with other sections of the revolutionary left in Turkey for some of whom the idea of a Kurdish identity, or need for a Kurdish liberation struggle, was as much of an anathema as it was for Turkey. The discussions and divisions of friendships, and betrayals which are all to often part of revolutionary organisation are presented here in a very human way, these are friends and former friends, and thinking people with strongly held opinions be they simply following a fundamentalist Party line, or that they have arrived at a position through what they believe to be clearly argued principles. One of the great things about this book is that it covers the period immediately before and leading up to the foundation of the PKK from a very human perspective. It presents many of the actors and their backgrounds and the conditions and situations which forged the PKK into the force which it became and remains (if today significantly metamorphosised in methodology and clearer in its practical humanistic aims).
For Sakine "What was important was the nature of the struggle and how individuals developed within it. Those who lived the way they liked, joined others voluntarily, and fought a little on the side, were not true revolutionaries. Anyone could do that. In Kurdistan, the militant struggle demanded more, and to be a Kurdistan Revolutionary was of a whole different order. Society, individuals, and classes were undergoing a process of dissolution. Contradictions and transformations were growing. First one must undergo a mental enlightenment, then embody it more and more in life. The process was tough and painful but also meaningful and beautiful."
This is an excellent biography and one which helps the reader to understand the realities of being a Kurd both at the point of the emergence of the contemporary liberation struggle in the 1960s up to today where while still short of victorious the movement has transformed Kurdish society to the point it has, in areas influenced by PKK philosophy also become a beacon for those seeking to transform society generally for the better.
October 23, 2025
The revolution had no fixed location and no homeland. Part of its beauty was to find it everywhere.
As I write, I'm experiencing them once again, with all my heart and with full consciousness. It was wonderful to arrive, so unconditionally and genuinely, through contradictions and struggles, at an ideal. It was an immense joy, and I will repeat it aloud now: I'm the happiest person in the world because I participate in this struggle.
As I write, I'm experiencing them once again, with all my heart and with full consciousness. It was wonderful to arrive, so unconditionally and genuinely, through contradictions and struggles, at an ideal. It was an immense joy, and I will repeat it aloud now: I'm the happiest person in the world because I participate in this struggle.
July 28, 2020
A very interesting insight into the conditions preceding the formation of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. I knew absolutely nothing about that, but prior knowledge isn't necessary to get a lot out of the book. I did get some names confused, and I would have liked more detail on the ideologies, but the cultural elements of it were very interesting
July 30, 2021
Una parte de la vida de Sakine escrita por ella misma con honestidad y sin reparos. Una lectura muy inspiradora que nos acerca un poco más a lo que fue el nacimiento del PKK y a lo que es el Movimiento de Mujeres de Liberación del Kurdistán.
September 7, 2024
As you can see by my start/finish dates, it took me months to read this. I enjoyed the first third of the book and then the middle and end just seemed so sluggish and frankly there were too many names, places, and parties for me to keep straight.
April 27, 2025
Si tratta della prima parte della vita di Sakine: davvero molto interessante, ben scritto e con molte note che aiutano a seguire e a ricordare chi siano gli altri personaggi citati.
Letto tutto d'un fiato.
Letto tutto d'un fiato.
May 27, 2022
Very interesting insight into Sakine's life, the context she lived in and the formation of the PKK
January 21, 2025
Captivated from beginning to end. Wow.
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August 31, 2018Biog C228c 2018
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews