ZEYNEP AKGÜL

Ankara- Some of us can be the subject of a forced or voluntary migration or exile sometimes due to our ideas, sometimes due to what we write, sometimes due to our ethnic origin and sometimes due to social oppression. Here is Yıldız Çakar, one of the subjects of that exile.

Yıldız had to leave Diyarbakir along with her family members when she was 15. She describes suffers she faced due to that exile as follows:

“We were just one of the Kurdish families who were attacked by unknown perpetrators in the 1990s. I also suffered from more than 20 knife wounds in my back, arms, and ribs when I was a child. I keep living with these wounds; their physical and mental effects never go away. I couldn’t be a normal person after that attack. My joys turn into anger, my dreams turn into darkness.”

We talk to Yıldız about homelessness- rootlessness and what changed her life when she wrote in Kurdish or Turkish, and her story with literature.

· Who is Yıldız Çakar? Can you talk about yourself?

I am originally from Karacadağ region of Diyarbakır. I am someone who met poetry early, who is interesting in mythology and science fiction. I am someone who loves children and cats and feels like she was living in dengbêj times (dengbêj- Kurdish storytellers).

·  In an interview you said, “I had to leave Diyarbakır with my family with bare and bloody feet when I was 15 years old. There is no description of that exile… it was more than scary for me.” What did you face?

Somethings are indescribable. Actually, I have talked about what happened just once, talking about blooding wounds is heavy for my psychology. I just want to say, “We were just one of the Kurdish families who were attacked by unknown perpetrators in the 1990s. I also suffered from more than 20 knife wounds in my back, arms, and ribs when I was a child. I keep living with these wounds; their physical and mental effects never go away. We never return to the home we left, we haven’t even stepped into that neighborhood.

· What has changed in your life after that attack?

Many things have changed. Firstly, I couldn’t be “normal” (person).  My joys turn into anger, my dreams turn into darkness. I was a quiet, calm, and angerless person but I became an angry, rebellious, and misfit person in my twenties.

“You have to leave even if you have no place to go”

· Leaving the geography you were born in… Wasn’t that difficult for you?

For me, home means the geography I live in. Therefore, migration and exile mean being divided. It means being divided between where you exist and where you have to go. Sometimes I think being exiled is like a single tree in the desert or a bird having o covey. But there is another point more difficult and heavier. Actually, you cannot describe or write that deep and blind point.  You have to leave even if you have no place to go. But you take the road without knowing where this road takes you to…

“Art and literature are the home of wounded spirit”

· The people engraving in Kurdish literature always spent their lives in exile. What are your comments about that?

It is the same in world literature not only in Kurdish literature. For example, when we look at German literature today, the most powerful novels, poems, plays were written in exile. For me, exile is a spiritual injury. The spirit resists not dying, and resisting forms new ways. Art and literature are the home of a wounded spirit. It becomes beautiful and grows in this way.

In an article I wrote two years ago, I described exile as follows:

“Trees in heavy rain regions are uprooted and fall over during storms. Whereas, in desert or dry places, trees spread their roots so deep to find water that this makes these trees indestructible against very strong storms. I feel like a tree in the desert.”

· Alright, how did you start to write?

Factors such as the literacy of my family members, the colorfulness of the newspapers and books bought for our house, and the strong narration of poetry, songs, and oral literature allowed me to learn our cultural richness. I know that the poems written by my mother and Pearl S. Buck's novel called “The Mother” had a lot of influence on me. Poetry is the biggest part of my life, but my prose and the fictional journey began with journalism.

“As I wrote in my native language, I felt that my missing parts were completed”

· You said, “I live in Kurdish. No matter what language I speak in Berlin, in Ankara, or elsewhere, I don't understand without translating what I hear into Kurdish in my mind.” What changes when you write in Kurdish or Turkish? And what are the difficulties of Kurdish literature?

I wrote Turkish poems in years when I didn't know how to write in Kurdish. When I started to write in Kurdish, both my childhood memory and my other memories followed me. As I wrote in my native language, I felt that my missing parts were completed. Sometimes I write in Turkish when I have to, but funny situations can appear because I cannot translate the logic of the expression.

Writing in Kurdish is not a problem for me. In fact, when I read translations of what I wrote in the last two years, I see the image of the language in the mirrors. Kurdish is a beautiful and rich language. It has been blocked, denied, and ignored but it is still a rich language.

The challenges confronted by the Kurdish language are the fact that Kurdish children cannot have education in their native language, the rate of literacy in the Kurdish language is low, and the biggest obstacles to the reaching and reading of what we write. We are talking about such a beautiful language and literature, but our education language is different. If children’s world of emotions and dreams cannot be shaped by their own native language, those children will not be able to understand the world of emotions and dreams in a Kurdish book in the future. This is the biggest challenge. The biggest reason for this is assimilation and the prevention of the right to education in Kurdish. Also, imagine that you are lynched, killed, and denied because you speak in your own native language. If there is no language, there is no literature. The existence of every people is their language.

“No one can oversimplify us by saying we are created from a man's uneven rips”

· As a woman, it is very difficult to exist in the world of literature that is unfortunately built with masculine language and cannot tolerate a different voice. What kind of challenges do you face in the world of literature?

The order we are in right now is the male power order. The states, systems, and sacred books are in conformity with male order. Ok, where is the mother creating us? Where is the woman shaping life, giving color and voice to life? We have many questions and we are looking for their answers. No one can oversimplify us by saying we are created from a man's uneven rips. Of course, every area of life is difficult for women. When we look at the number of women killed every day in the street, at home, in the workplace, we see that the difficulty is not only in the field of literature and art.

Whenever the ruling system of the men is in danger, then they roll up their sleeves. After my first novel was published, I understand the male order and its systematics better. The male power works in an organized manner and places harmless and obedient people in every corner and this situation is not only about today, it has a huge dark background. It has people and among them, there are "poets" and "writers" who do not only harm their own power and will not speak up even if the world collapses. In such an environment, if a woman has a claim, does not obey the order, believes, and speaks what she knows means many things can happen to her. They try all kinds of ways to prevent you. They can do everything to prevent you. But we should believe that a lie has no legs.  Yes, I was censored and blocked. You've got to walk through the darkness to get to the light.

· As a writer, who are your favorite writers?

I really like Latin American literature. Gabriel Garcia Márquez, Jorge Luis Borges, Juan Rulfo, Carlos Fuentes, Julio Cortázar. I find the writing world of these writers very close to my writing world. There are also writers and books. I love Proust, Derrida, and many more; these are the first ones that come to my mind right now.  The last book (play) I read is Anton Chekhov’s “Three Sisters”.

· Last question: Have you taken part in any projects recently?

I am planning to publish my new book called, “Hangar Fünf, Deriyê Winda”. Recently, I have taken part in a digital theater project that aims to draw attention to femicide, with the participation of many people from many countries.  It will be published digitally in the upcoming period.

One part of my Kurdish play called, “Bîra Miriyan” was released digitally at the Maxim Gorky Theater in Berlin on August 29. It is a play about Saturday Mothers and Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in Argentina. I also took part in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre’s 2019-2020 European project. The plays we wrote were canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic while they were ready to be performed.