Kurdistan +100

Book excerpt: Kurdistan +100 poses a question to twelve contemporary Kurdish writers: might the Kurds have a country to call their own by the year 2046 – exactly a century after the last glimmer of independence (the short-lived Kurdish Republic of Mahabad)? Or might the struggle for independence have taken new turns and new forms? Throughout the 20th century (and so far in the 21st), the Kurds have been betrayed, suppressed, stripped of their basic rights (from citizenship to the freedom to speak their own language) and had their political aspirations crushed at every turn. In this groundbreaking anthology, Kurdish authors (including several former political prisoners, and one currently serving a 183-year sentence for his views) imagine a freer future, one in which it is no longer effectively illegal to be a Kurd. From future eco-activism, to drone warfare, to the resuscitation of victims of past massacres, these stories explore different sides of the present struggle through the metaphor of futurism to dazzling effect. Featuring Qadir Agid, Yildiz Cakar, Selahattin Demirtas, Omer Dilsoz, Muharrem Erbey, Nariman Evdike, Ava Homa, Hüseyin Karabey, Karzan Kardosi, Sema Kaygusuz, Meral Simsek & Jahangir Mahmood Waysi.