Neden mi BESIKTAS ?

Tuttuğum takıma hitaben;

Güzel günlerimiz oldu seninle. Gerektiğinde güldük, gerektiğinde ağladık. Asla senden utanmadım, utanmayacağım da. Herkes hakkında atıp tutuyor. Sabırlı davranıyorum. Ama sabrın taşınca da ağızlarının payını verebiliyorum.

Seni izlerken ağladığımda oldu. Çok iyi hatırlıyorum Ts-BJK maçı.. Bütün mahalle bizim evde. Fenerlisinden tut galatasaraylısına kadar herkes oradaydı. Maç iyiydi ama burası kötüydü. Herkes tsyi tutuyordu. İlk yarıyı önde kapattığımız maçı yenildik. Maç bitince herkes hatta dünya üstüme geliyormuş gibi oldu. Herkes bağırıp çağırıyordu. Sonra arkadan bir el omzumdan tuttu. Babamdı.. Kötü olduğumu gördü. "Takma kafana. Bu uğurda yenmekte var yenilmekte. Sen üstüne düşen görevi yaptın. O'nu destekledin." dedi. Küçük bir çocuk aklıyla hayaller kurmaya başladım. BEŞİKTAŞ... ilk on biri Kurtuluş savaşında şehit düşen takım. Nize şerefli ikincilikleri olan takım. Semtiyle öne çıkan bir takım.

Senden utanmak bir an bile aklıma gelmiyor. Utananlar utansın. Bir Gün Değil Her Gün BEŞİKTAŞ. Neden BEŞİKTAŞ diye soranlara:

Neden mi BEŞİKTAŞ ? Çünkü; Siyah-Beyaz başlamıştı her şey. Fotoğraflar Siyah-Beyaz'dı... Yazlık sinemalar Siyah-Beyaz'dı... Gözümüzün kara, alnımızın ak olması öğretildi hep... Kara gecelerde Beyaz sayfalara döktük içimizi... Kara sevdalarımız oldu, Beyaz umutlarla beslediğimiz... Ve gün gelecek kara toprağa beyaz kefenlerle gireceğiz hepimiz...

Yeni Bir Çizgi Daha

Yaklaşık 2 ay önce bugünün önemi bende daha farklıydı. 

Aslında bu yazıyı yazmak istemiyordum. Belki tepki alabilirim belkide almam. Ama artık unutmak istiyorum, beceremiyorum malesef...

Tam 5 sene önce TSK'nın göz bebeği olan bir okula girdim. Asla pişman olmayacağım bir şeydi. Evet 14 yaşında subay olma hayalim vardı. Ne kadar çılgınca değil mi? Ailenin yanından gelişme çağında ayrılıyorsun ve yepyeni bir dünyaya adım atıyorsun. Güzel günlerimi geçirdim, yalan değil. Gururla söylerim hala "Ben Kuleli'liyim" diye. her zamanda söyleyeceğim.

Her sene 30 Ağustos gününde Türk Silahlı Kuvvetleri'nde rütbe terfi törenleri olur. Bizimde sabırsızlıkla beklediğimiz bir gündü. Yeni bir çizgi daha gelecekti omuzlarımıza. Bir çizgi, iki çizgi, üç çizgi derken yolun son dönemecine geldik. Dört çizgi.... Evet son sınıftım artık. Mezun olacağımın verdiği gururlu bir sene. Güzel, duygusal ve biraz üzüntülü bir mezuniyet geçirdim. Kardeşlerimden ayrılıyordum. Ama her zaman beraber olacağımızı biliyorum.

Mezun oldukta noldu? . Gittik Kaybolan Hayaller Okuluna. Kardeşlerimi bir bir kaybettim. Sonunda bende bırakmak zorunda bırakıldım. Tek çizgiyi yine omuzladık. Dört çizgiden sonra tekrar bir çizgiye düşmek koymaz mı insana? Tabiki de koyar. Ömürlerinde daha dört çizgiyi yeni takan, kendini bir b*k sanan insanlarla yaşamak zorunda kaldım. Onların yüzüne vurduğum bir söz vardır. paylaşmak isterim. "Siz şimdi dört çizgiyi takarken biz çöpe atıp geldik." bunu duyan vasıfsız insan topluluğundaki bir afra tafraları görseniz.... 

Bugün vasıfsız insanların yanında okumak zorunda kalan değerli kardeşlerimin ikinci çizgilerini şimdiden kutlarım ve hayırlara vesile olmasını dilerim. Ayrıca Türk Milleti'nin Zafer Bayramı'nı kutlarım. Peygamber Ocağı olan asker ocağındaki herkesin yeni rütbesi hayırlı olsun.

Sevgilerle Kardeş'lerim....

Nobel ödüllü insan hakları lideri: Martin Luther King, Jr

O bir aktivistti, eylem adamıydı. O bir papazdı. Nobel ödüllü insan hakları lideriydi. Irk ayrımına karşı çıkan, ırkların eşitliğini savunan ve bunun için binlerce kilometre yol katederek ırkçılığa, eşitsizliğe, "beyaz adam"ın üstünlüğüne karşı direniş göstermiş biriydi. Defalarca hapse girdi, suikastlere uğradı.

İnsan hakları, insanlık onuru, eşiklik ve özgürlüklerin sesiydi.

Şiddet içermeyen ama taleplerinden de asla vazgeçmeyen King, 1960'ların dünyasında sadece Afro-Amerikalıların değil, tüm insan hakları savunucularının 'ikonu' haline gelmişti.

Bir bahar günü (4 Nisan 1968) Memphis'te kaldığı otelin balkonunda otururken uğradığı suikast sonucu öldüğünde daha 39 yaşındaydı.

Amerika'da bugün Martin Luther King'i (MLK) anma günü. Federal tatil. 1986 yılından bu yana, 15 Ocak 1929'da doğan MLK'nin doğum gününe yakın olsun diye Ocak ayının üçüncü Pazartesi günü MLK Günü olarak anılıyor.

Türkiye'de, barış adına umutlanmışken, "evet, nihayet geliyor" diye heveslenmişken, bu umut ve heves kursağımızda kaldı, bırakılıyor...

Dün MLK'i anma günüydü. Bugün söz Martin Luther King'in:





BİR HAYALİM VAR!

Ülkemiz tarihinde özgürlüklerle ilgili düzenlenmiş olan bu en büyük gösteride, şu anda aranızda bulunmaktan kıvanç duyuyorum.

Bundan bir asır kadar önce, şu an manevi himayesinde bulunduğumuz Büyük Amerika'lı, Özgürlük Beyannamesi'ni imzalanmıştı. Bu tarihi belge, esaret zinciri altında yaşamış ve adaletsizlik ateşiyle yanıp kavrulmuş milyonlarca zenci için, uzun ve zifiri karanlık esaret gecelerini sona erdirecek bir umut ışığı haline gelmişti. Ancak ne yazık ki, bundan 100 yıl sonra bile, siyahlar hala özgür değil ve hayatlarını ırkçılığın ve ayrımcılığın prangalarına mahkûm olarak, sürünerek geçiriyorlar.

Uçsuz bucaksız zenginlikler okyanusun içinde, fakirlikle kuşatılmış yalnız bir adada yaşıyorlar. Hala kendilerini Amerika toplumundan dışlanmış, kendi toprakları üzerinde sürgün hissediyorlar ve acılar içinde kıvranıyorlar. İşte bu maksatla; bugün, bu utanç verici durumu gözler önüne sermek için burada toplanmış bulunuyoruz.

Bir anlamda bugün, ülke başkentine artık vadesi dolmuş çeklerimizi bozdurmak için geldik. Büyük Cumhuriyetimizin yüksek mimarı, İnsan Hakları Beyannamesi'nin ve anayasamızın muhteşem sözlerini imzaladıklarında, aynı zamanda her bir Amerikalı'nın bu mirastan kendine düşen payı alabileceğini de vaad etmekteydiler.

Bu öyle bir vaatti ki, herkesin; evet, siyah olsun beyaz olsun herkesin vazgeçilmez ve devredilemez, özgürce yaşama ve mutlu olma haklarını teminat altına almaktaydı.

Bu gün artık şurası gerçektir ki, Amerika vaat edilen bu haktan, vatandaşlarının renkleri söz konusu olduğunda, vazgeçmiş gibi görünüyor. Bu kutsal yükümlülüğü ifa etmek yerine, zenci vatandaşlara, üzerinde "karşılıksız" yazan sahte çekler veriliyor.

Ancak biz, Adalet Bankası'nın iflas etmiş olduğuna inanmıyoruz. Bu ülkenin engin fırsatlar hazinesinin iflas etmiş olduğuna inanmak istemiyoruz. Onun için buraya; bu çekin, dilediğimiz anda özgürlüğümüzü ve sosyal güvencemizi geri verecek olan bu çekin, karşılığını almaya geldik.

Ayrıca, bu kutsal mekândan, Amerika'ya, bu işin çok acil olduğunu hatırlatmaya geldik. İşleri ağırdan alma veya uyuşturucu çekmiş kişiler gibi yavaştan hareket etme zamanı değildir. Vakit, demokrasiyle ilgili vaatlerin gerçekleştirme zamanıdır. Vakit, ulusumuzu adaletsizlik ve ırkçılık bataklığından, kardeşliğin sağlam zeminine oturtma zamanıdır. Vakit, tanrının tüm evlatları arasında gerçekleştirme zamanıdır.

İçinde bulunduğumuz şu anın aciliyetini görmezden gelmek ve bizi siyah vatandaşların kararlılığını yanlış değerlendirmemek, ülkemiz için gerçek bir felaket olabilir. Siyahların memnuniyetsizliğinin yol açtığı bu bunaltıcı sıcak yaz ateşi, ta ki kardeşliğin ve özgürlüğün geleceği serin sonbahar günlerine kadar sürecektir. 1963 yılı bir son değil, yalnızca bir başlangıçtır. "Zencilerin biraz hava atıp boşalmaya ihtiyaçları var, bunlar hemen sakinleşirler" diye düşünenler şunu iyi bilsinler ki, eğer bu usul önceki tutumlarına yeniden dönecek olursa, sarsıcı bir uyanışla karşılaşacaklardır. Zencilerin vatandaşlık hakları verilmediği sürece, Amerika'da ne bir rahat ne de bir huzur kalacaktır. Ta ki, adaletin aydınlığına kavuşuncaya kadar, isyan fırtınaları ulusumuzun temellerini sarsmaya devam edecektir.

Adalet sarayına giden sıcak eşiğin üzerinde durmakta olan halkıma da söylenecek bir çift sözüm var. Haklı davamızı gerçekleştirme yolunda yanlış tutum ve davranışların esiri olmamalıyız.

Hürriyet ateşimizi acı ve nefret kâsesinden içerek söndürmeye çalışmalıyız. Mücadelemizi daima vekar ve disiplinin yüce kanatları altında sürdürmeliyiz. Yaratıcı protestolarımızın fiziksel bir şiddete dönüşmesine asla müsaade etmemeliyiz. Her zaman, fiziksel gücü, manevi gücümüzün sonsuz yücelikleriyle karşılık vermeliyiz.

Zenci toplumunu çepeçevre kuşatmış bulunan bu yeni ve kutsal militan ruh, bizi tüm beyaz insanlara karşı bir güvencesizliğe yöneltmemelidir. Beyaz kardeşlerimizin pek çoğu, kendi kaderlerinin bizimki ile sıkı sıkıya bağlı olduğunu idrak etmektedir. Bunun en güzel delili, şu an bizim aramızda bulunmuş olmalarıdır. Biz, bu yolu tek başımıza yürüyemeyiz.

Yolumuzda ilerlerken; daima ileriye bakacağımıza söz vermeliyiz. Artık geri dönmemiz mümkün değil... Kendilerini vatandaşlık hakları uğruna adamış kimselere, "Daha ne zaman tatmin olacaksınız?" diyenlere, zenci halkın hiçbir zaman dile getiremediği polis zulüm ve dehşetin bittiği ana kadar, "Asla tatmin olmayacağız!" diyeceğiz.

Bizler, bu yolda yürümekten bitkin düşmüş vücutlarımız, otobandaki motellerde ve şehirdeki otellerde istirahat edemedikçe, asla tatmin olmayacağız.

Bizler, çocuklarımızı kimliklerinden sıyıran ve insanlık değerlerinden koparan "Beyazlara mahsustur" yazan tabelalar var olduğu müddetçe asla tatmin olmayacağız.

Bizler, Mississippi'deki bir zenci oy veremediği ve New York'taki bir zenci oy vermeye değer bir şey olmadığına inandığı müddetçe, asla tatmin olmayacağız.

Bizler, adalet sular gibi çağlamadıkça ve haklar gür bir nehir gibi coşmadıkça, katiyen tatmin olamayız ve olamayacağız.

Bir çoğunuzun buraya büyük bir çalkantı ve zorlukların içinden sıyrılarak geldiğinizi anlamıyor değilim. Kiminiz daracık zindanlardan henüz kurtulmuş olarak burada bulunuyorsunuz. Kimileriniz de, hürriyet aşkınız zulüm rüzgârlarıyla gölgelendiği ve polis işkencesiyle tepelendiği yerlerden geliyorsunuz.

Sizler, ıstırabın her çeşidini tatmış kahramanlarsınız! Acı çekmeden kazanılan başarıların gelip geçici olduğu inancıyla, yolunuza devam edin...

Bu durumun bir şekilde değiştirilebileceğini ve mutlaka değişeceğini bilerek Mississippi'ye dönün, Alabama'ya dönün, Güney Carolin'e, Georgia'ya, Louisiana'ya dönün, modern şehirlerimizin kıyısındaki fakirhanelerinize ve gettolarınıza geri dönün.

Bugün size şunu hatırlatıyorum ki, dostlarım, ümitsizlik batağında boğulmayalım. Şu an yaşamış olduğumuz ve önümüzde bulunan zorluklara rağmen, hala bir hayalim var benim. Bu hayal, Amerikan rüyasının derinliklerine kök salmış bir hayaldir.

Evet... Bir hayalim var benim...

Gün gelecek, bu ulus ayağa kalkacak ve kendi inanç değerlerini tam anlamıyla yaşayacak. Şu husus apaçık ortadadır ki, bütün insanlar eşit yaratılmıştır.

Bir hayalim var benim!...

Gün gelecek, bir zamanlar köle olanların evlatlarıyla yine bir zamanlar köle sahiplerinin evlatları, Georgia'nın kızıl tepelerinde, birlikte kardeşlik sofrasına oturabilecekler...

Bir hayalim var benim...

Gün gelecek, Mississippi eyaleti bile, adaletsizliğin ve baskıların ateşiyle bunalmış olan o eyalet bile, bir özgürlük ve adalet vahasına dönüşecek...

Bir hayalim var benim...

Gün gelecek, dört büyük çocuğum, derilerinin rengine göre değil, karakterlerinin yapısına göre değerlendirilecekleri bir ülkede yaşayacaklar...

Bugün bir hayalim var benim...

Gün gelecek, Alabama eyaleti, şirret ırkçıları ile, ağzından hep müdahale ve yasaklar yönünde sözler dökülen valisi ile, o eyalet bile, minicik siyah erkek ve kız çocuklarının, minicik beyaz erkek ve kız çocukları ile, kardeşçe el ele tutuşabilecekleri bir yer olacaktır...

Bugün bir hayalim var benim...

Evet, bir hayalim var!.. Gün gelecek, özgürlüğümüzün önünde birer engel olan bütün vadiler yükselecek, bütün dağlar eğilecek, engebeli yerler hizaya gelecek ve Allah'ın yüce şanı yeryüzüne inecek ve bütün canlılar bunu hep birlikte göreceğiz.

Bizim umudumuzdur bu... Bu umutla Güneye gideceğiz. Bu inançla umutsuzluk dağlarını yontarak bir umut anıtı yapacağız. Bu inançla ülkeyi saran ahenksiz sesleri kardeşliğin senfonisine dönüştüreceğiz. Bu inanç sayesinde, bir gün özgür olacağınızı bilerek, hep beraber mücadele edecek, hep beraber hapse düşecek ve hürriyetiçin hep beraber ayağa kalkacağız.

İşte o gün yüce Allah'ın bütün kulları yepyeni bir ruhla söylenecekler bu şarkıyı:

Benim ülkem, senin ülken.
Özgürlüğün güzel yurdu,
Sana söylüyorum bu şarkıyı.
Atalarımın öldüğü toprak burası.
Şehitlerin gururu olan toprak...
Her bir dağın yamacından,
Özgürlük yankılanacak!

Ve eğer Amerika büyük bir ülke olacaksa, bunun gerçekleşmesi şarttır. Öyle ise,

New Hampshire'ın yüce tepelerinden özgürlük...

Yankılansın, New York'un ulu dağlarından...

Ve... Pennsylvania dağ kasabalarının zirvelerinden...

Colorado'nun karlarla kaplı kayalıklarından yankılansın!..

Yankılansın, California'nın kıvrımlı yamaçlarından...

Yalnızca Georgia'nın yalçın dağlarından değil,

Mississippi'deki her bir ağacın yamacından yankılansın özgürlük...

Ve bunu başardığımızda, her kasabadan ve köyden, her eyaletten ve kentten özgürlük şarkısının yankısını duyduğumuzda, o gün daha da yakın olacak ve Allah'ın bütün kulları siyahlar ve beyazlar, Yahudiler, Hıristiyanlar, Müslümanlar ve Budistler el ele tutuşarak siyahların eski bir ilahisini söyleyecekler.

Sonunda özgürüz!
Şükürler olsun Ya Rabbim!
Sonunda hepimiz özgürüz.
(28 Ağustos 1963, Washington DC)

Great Leader of Freedom Movement: Martin Luther King, Jr.

I think he is great man. Because they marched, America became more free and fair. He is unforgettable.

http://ia600402.us.archive.org/29/items/MLKDream/MLKDream_64kb.mp3

MARTIN LUTHER KING'S FREEDOM SPEECH


I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.
We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.
We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.
Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.
And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today!
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."
This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:
My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,
From every mountainside, let freedom ring!
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.
And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that:
Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:
                Free at last! Free at last!
                Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

Americans of all backgrounds and colours massed on Washington DC's National Mall to remember the event that gave the civil rights movement unstoppable momentum

The Politics of Fiction

I'm a storyteller. That's what I do in life -- telling stories, writing novels -- and today I would like to tell you a few stories about the art of storytelling and also some supernatural creatures called the djinni. But before I go there, please allow me to share with youglimpses of my personal story. I will do so with the help of words, of course, but also a geometrical shape, the circle, so throughout my talk, you will come across several circles.

I was born in Strasbourg, France to Turkish parents. Shortly after, my parents got separated, and I came to Turkey with my mom. From then on, I was raised as a single child by a single mother. Now in the early 1970s, in Ankara, that was a bit unusual. Our neighborhood was full of large families, where fathers were the heads of households, so I grew up seeing my mother as a divorcee in a patriarchal environment. In fact, I grew up observing two different kinds of womanhood. On the one hand was my mother, a well-educated, secular, modern, westernized, Turkish woman. On the other hand was my grandmother, who also took care of me and was more spiritual, less educated and definitely less rational. This was a woman who read coffee grounds to see the future and melted lead into mysterious shapes to fend off the evil eye.

Many people visited my grandmother, people with severe acne on their faces or warts on their hands. Each time, my grandmother would utter some words in Arabic, take a red apple and stab it with as many rose thorns as the number of warts she wanted to remove. Then one by one, she would encircle these thorns with dark ink. A week later, the patient would come back for a follow-up examination. Now, I'm aware that I should not be saying such things in front of an audience of scholars and scientists, but the truth is, of all the peoplewho visited my grandmother for their skin conditions, I did not see anyone go back unhappy or unhealed. I asked her how she did this. Was it the power of praying? In response she said, "Yes, praying is effective, but also beware of the power of circles."

From her, I learned, amongst many other things, one very precious lesson -- that if you want to destroy something in this life, be it an acne, a blemish or the human soul, all you need to do is to surround it with thick walls. It will dry up inside. Now we all live in some kind of a social and cultural circle. We all do. We're born into a certain family, nation, class. But if we have no connection whatsoever with the worlds beyond the one we take for granted, then we too run the risk of drying up inside. Our imagination might shrink; our hearts might dwindle,and our humanness might wither if we stay for too long inside our cultural cocoons. Our friends, neighbors, colleagues, family -- if all the people in our inner circle resemble us, it means we are surrounded with our mirror image.

Now one other thing women like my grandma do in Turkey is to cover mirrors with velvet or to hang them on the walls with their backs facing out. It's an old Eastern tradition based on the knowledge that it's not healthy for a human being to spend too much time staring at his own reflection. Ironically, [living in] communities of the like-minded is one of the greatest dangers of today's globalized world. And it's happening everywhere, among liberals and conservatives, agnostics and believers, the rich and the poor, East and West alike. We tend to form clusters based on similarity, and then we produce stereotypes about other clusters of people. In my opinion, one way of transcending these cultural ghettos is through the art of storytelling. Stories cannot demolish frontiers, but they can punch holes in our mental walls.And through those holes, we can get a glimpse of the other, and sometimes even like what we see.

I started writing fiction at the age of eight. My mother came home one day with a turquoise notebook and asked me if I'd be interested in keeping a personal journal. In retrospect, I think she was slightly worried about my sanity. I was constantly telling stories at home, which was good, except I told this to imaginary friends around me, which was not so good. I was an introverted child, to the point of communicating with colored crayons and apologizing to objects when I bumped into them, so my mother thought it might do me good to write down my day-to-day experiences and emotions. What she didn't know was that I thought my life was terribly boring, and the last thing I wanted to do was to write about myself.Instead, I began to write about people other than me and things that never really happened.And thus began my life-long passion for writing fiction. So from the very beginning, fiction for me was less of an autobiographical manifestation than a transcendental journey into other lives, other possibilities. And please bear with me: I'll draw a circle and come back to this point.

Now one other thing happened around this same time. My mother became a diplomat. So from this small, superstitious, middle-class neighborhood of my grandmother, I was zoomed into this posh, international school [in Madrid], where I was the only Turk. It was here that I had my first encounter with what I call the "representative foreigner." In our classroom, there were children from all nationalities, yet this diversity did not necessarily lead to a cosmopolitan, egalitarian classroom democracy. Instead, it generated an atmosphere in which each child was seen -- not as an individual on his own, but as the representative of something larger. We were like a miniature United Nations, which was fun, except whenever something negative, with regards to a nation or a religion, took place. The child who represented it was mocked, ridiculed and bullied endlessly. And I should know, because during the time I attended that school, a military takeover happened in my country, a gunman of my nationality nearly killed the Pope, and Turkey got zero points in [the] Eurovision Song Contest. 

I skipped school often and dreamed of becoming a sailor during those days. I also had my first taste of cultural stereotypes there. The other children asked me about the movie"Midnight Express," which I had not seen; they inquired how many cigarettes a day I smoked, because they thought all Turks were heavy smokers, and they wondered at what age I would start covering my hair. I came to learn that these were the three main stereotypes about my country: politics, cigarettes and the veil. After Spain, we went to Jordan, Germany and Ankara again. Everywhere I went, I felt like my imagination was the only suitcase I could take with me. Stories gave me a sense of center, continuity and coherence, the three big Cs that I otherwise lacked.

In my mid-twenties, I moved to Istanbul, the city I adore. I lived in a very vibrant, diverse neighborhood where I wrote several of my novels. I was in Istanbul when the earthquake hitin 1999. When I ran out of the building at three in the morning, I saw something that stopped me in my tracks. There was the local grocer there -- a grumpy, old man who didn't sell alcohol and didn't speak to marginals. He was sitting next to a transvestite with a long black wig and mascara running down her cheeks. I watched the man open a pack of cigaretteswith trembling hands and offer one to her, and that is the image of the night of the earthquake in my mind today -- a conservative grocer and a crying transvestite smoking together on the sidewalk. In the face of death and destruction, our mundane differences evaporated, and we all became one even if for a few hours. But I've always believed that stories, too, have a similar effect on us. I'm not saying that fiction has the magnitude of an earthquake, but when we are reading a good novel, we leave our small, cozy apartments behind, go out into the night alone and start getting to know people we had never met beforeand perhaps had even been biased against.

Shortly after, I went to a women's college in Boston, then Michigan. I experienced this, not so much as a geographical shift, as a linguistic one. I started writing fiction in English. I'm not an immigrant, refugee or exile -- they ask me why I do this -- but the commute between languages gives me the chance to recreate myself. I love writing in Turkish, which to me is very poetic and very emotional, and I love writing in English, which to me is very mathematical and cerebral. So I feel connected to each language in a different way. For me, like millions of other people around the world today, English is an acquired language. When you're a latecomer to a language, what happens is you live there with a continuous and perpetual frustration. As latecomers, we always want to say more, you know, crack better jokes, say better things, but we end up saying less because there's a gap between the mind and the tongue. And that gap is very intimidating. But if we manage not to be frightened by it, it's also stimulating. And this is what I discovered in Boston -- that frustration was very stimulating.

At this stage, my grandmother, who had been watching the course of my life with increasing anxiety, started to include in her daily prayers that I urgently get married so that I could settle down once and for all. And because God loves her, I did get married.  But instead of settling down, I went to Arizona. And since my husband is in Istanbul, I started commuting between Arizona and Istanbul -- the two places on the surface of earth that couldn't be more different. I guess one part of me has always been a nomad, physically and spiritually. Stories accompany me, keeping my pieces and memories together, like an existential glue.

Yet as much as I love stories, recently, I've also begun to think that they lose their magic if and when a story is seen as more than a story. And this is a subject that I would love to think about together. When my first novel written in English came out in America, I heard an interesting remark from a literary critic. "I liked your book," he said, "but I wish you had written it differently."  I asked him what he meant by that. He said, "Well, look at it. There's so many Spanish, American, Hispanic characters in it, but there's only one Turkish character and it's a man." Now the novel took place on a university campus in Boston, so to me, it was normal that there be more international characters in it than Turkish characters, but I understood what my critic was looking for. And I also understood that I would keep disappointing him. He wanted to see the manifestation of my identity. He was looking for a Turkish woman in the book because I happened to be one.

We often talk about how stories change the world, but we should also see how the world of identity politics affects the way stories are being circulated, read and reviewed. Many authors feel this pressure, but non-Western authors feel it more heavily. If you're a woman writer from the Muslim world, like me, then you are expected to write the stories of Muslim women and, preferably, the unhappy stories of unhappy Muslim women. You're expected to write informative, poignant and characteristic stories and leave the experimental and avant-garde to your Western colleagues. What I experienced as a child in that school in Madrid is happening in the literary world today. Writers are not seen as creative individuals on their own, but as the representatives of their respective cultures: a few authors from China, a few from Turkey, a few from Nigeria. We're all thought to have something very distinctive, if not peculiar.

The writer and commuter James Baldwin gave an interview in 1984 in which he was repeatedly asked about his homosexuality. When the interviewer tried to pigeonhole him as a gay writer, Baldwin stopped and said, "But don't you see? There's nothing in me that is not in everybody else, and nothing in everybody else that is not in me." When identity politics tries to put labels on us, it is our freedom of imagination that is in danger. There's a fuzzy category called multicultural literature in which all authors from outside the Western world are lumped together. I never forget my first multicultural reading, in Harvard Square about 10 years ago. We were three writers, one from the Philippines, one Turkish and one Indonesian -- like a joke, you know. And the reason why we were brought together was not because we shared an artistic style or a literary taste. It was only because of our passports. Multicultural writers are expected to tell real stories, not so much the imaginary. A function is attributed to fiction. In this way, not only the writers themselves, but also their fictional characters become the representatives of something larger.

But I must quickly add that this tendency to see a story as more than a story does not solely come from the West. It comes from everywhere. And I experienced this firsthandwhen I was put on trial in 2005 for the words my fictional characters uttered in a novel. I had intended to write a constructive, multi-layered novel about an Armenian and a Turkish familythrough the eyes of women. My micro story became a macro issue when I was prosecuted.Some people criticized, others praised me for writing about the Turkish-Armenian conflict.But there were times when I wanted to remind both sides that this was fiction. It was just a story. And when I say, "just a story," I'm not trying to belittle my work. I want to love and celebrate fiction for what it is, not as a means to an end.

Writers are entitled to their political opinions, and there are good political novels out there,but the language of fiction is not the language of daily politics. Chekhov said, "The solution to a problem and the correct way of posing the question are two completely separate things.And only the latter is an artist's responsibility." Identity politics divides us. Fiction connects.One is interested in sweeping generalizations. The other, in nuances. One draws boundaries. The other recognizes no frontiers. Identity politics is made of solid bricks.Fiction is flowing water.

In the Ottoman times, there were itinerant storytellers called "meddah." They would go to coffee houses, where they would tell a story in front of an audience, often improvising. With each new person in the story, the meddah would change his voice, impersonating that character. Everybody could go and listen, you know -- ordinary people, even the sultan, Muslims and non-Muslims. Stories cut across all boundaries, like "The Tales of Nasreddin Hodja," which were very popular throughout the Middle East, North Africa, the Balkans and Asia. Today, stories continue to transcend borders. When Palestinian and Israeli politicians talk, they usually don't listen to each other, but a Palestinian reader still reads a novel by a Jewish author, and vice versa, connecting and empathizing with the narrator. Literature has to take us beyond. If it cannot take us there, it is not good literature.

Books have saved the introverted, timid child that I was -- that I once was. But I'm also aware of the danger of fetishizing them. When the poet and mystic, Rumi, met his spiritual companion, Shams of Tabriz, one of the first things the latter did was to toss Rumi's books into water and watch the letters dissolve. The Sufis say, "Knowledge that takes you not beyond yourself is far worse than ignorance." The problem with today's cultural ghettos is not lack of knowledge -- we know a lot about each other, or so we think -- but knowledge that takes us not beyond ourselves: it makes us elitist, distant and disconnected. There's a metaphor which I love: living like a drawing compass. As you know, one leg of the compass is static, rooted in a place. Meanwhile, the other leg draws a wide circle, constantly moving.Like that, my fiction as well. One part of it is rooted in Istanbul, with strong Turkish roots,but the other part travels the world, connecting to different cultures. In that sense, I like to think of my fiction as both local and universal, both from here and everywhere.

Now those of you who have been to Istanbul have probably seen Topkapi Palace, which was the residence of Ottoman sultans for more than 400 years. In the palace, just outside the quarters of the favorite concubines, there's an area called The Gathering Place of the Djinn.It's between buildings. I'm intrigued by this concept. We usually distrust those areas that fall in between things. We see them as the domain of supernatural creatures like the djinn, who are made of smokeless fire and are the symbol of elusiveness. But my point is perhaps that elusive space is what writers and artists need most. When I write fiction I cherish elusiveness and changeability. I like not knowing what will happen 10 pages later. I like it when my characters surprise me. I might write about a Muslim woman in one novel, and perhaps it will be a very happy story, and in my next book, I might write about a handsome, gay professor in Norway. As long as it comes from our hearts, we can write about anything and everything.

Audre Lorde once said, "The white fathers taught us to say, 'I think, therefore I am.'" She suggested, "I feel, therefore I am free." I think it was a wonderful paradigm shift. And yet, why is it that, in creative writing courses today, the very first thing we teach students is"write what you know"? Perhaps that's not the right way to start at all. Imaginative literature is not necessarily about writing who we are or what we know or what our identity is about.We should teach young people and ourselves to expand our hearts and write what we can feel. We should get out of our cultural ghetto and go visit the next one and the next.

In the end, stories move like whirling dervishes, drawing circles beyond circles. They connect all humanity, regardless of identity politics, and that is the good news. And I would like to finish with an old Sufi poem: "Come, let us be friends for once; let us make life easy on us; let us be lovers and loved ones; the earth shall be left to no one."

Thank you.

Elif Shafak's speech inTED  http://www.ted.com/talks/elif_shafak_the_politics_of_fiction.html