Sara: My Whole Life Was a Struggle

The bitter struggle of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) against the Turkish state has endured for decades in the face of major setbacks and violence. This memoir tells that story through the experience of one person, Sakine Cansiz—codenamed “Sara”—a cofounder of the PKK who dedicated her life to its cause—until she was assassinated in 2013.
This memoir, available for the first time in English, tells the story of the first chapter of Cansiz’s life, from the founding of the PKK in 1974 through her arrest in 1979. She writes here about the excitement of entering the movement as a young woman—and discovering quickly that she would have to challenge traditional gender roles as she rose among its ranks. And she succeeded: total gender equality is now one of the central tenets of the PKK.
Today, Sara lives on, an inspiration to women fighting for liberation around the world. Her story, told in her own words, is by turns shocking, violent, and groundbreaking.