Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Manal al-Sharif

Quote by Manal al-Sharif

“My face is my identity. No one will cover it. I’m proud of my face. If my face bothers you, don’t look. Turn your own face away, take your eyes off me. If you are seduced by merely looking at my face, that is your problem. Do not tell me to cover it. You cannot punish me simply because you cannot control yourself.”

Quote by Manal al-Sharif

Work

Daring to Drive: A Saudi Woman's Awakening

This book is a personal account of a Saudi woman's life and her struggle for freedom and autonomy, focusing on the symbolic act of driving. It details her experiences growing up in a conservative environment, the challenges she faced, and her eventual decision to defy the ban on female drivers. The narrative explores themes of courage, resilience, and the broader fight for women's rights in Saudi Arabia, offering insight into the cultural and legal barriers that women encounter. more

Author

Manal al-Sharif
Manal al-Sharif

Manal al-Sharif is a prominent Saudi Arabian activist known for her advocacy for women's rights, particularly the right to drive. Born on April 25, 1979, she became internationally recognized after being arrested for driving in 2011, an act that was illegal for women in Saudi Arabia at the time. Al-Sharif's activism has been pivotal in the ongoing campaign to end the ban on women driving in the country. more

You May Also Like

“The surest guide to the correctness of the path that women take is joy in the struggle. Revolution is the festival of the oppressed. For a long time there may be no perceptible reward for women other than their new sense of purpose and integrity. Joy does not mean riotous glee, but it does mean the purposive employment of energy in a self-chosen enterprise. It does mean pride and confidence. It does mean communication and cooperation with others based on delight in their company and your own. To be emancipated from helplessness and need and walk freely upon the earth that is your birthright. To refuse hobbles and deformity and take possession of your body and glory in its power, accepting its own laws of loveliness. To have something to desire, something to make, something to achieve, and at last something genuine to give. To be freed from guilt and shame and the tireless self-discipline of women. To stop pretending and dissembling, cajoling and manipulating, and begin to control and sympathize. To claim the masculine virtues of magnanimity and generosity and courage. It goes much further than equal pay for equal work, for it ought to revolutionise the conditions of work completely. It does not understand the phrase 'equality of opportunity', for it seems that the opportunities will have to be utterly changed and women's souls changed so that they desire opportunity instead of shrinking from it.”

“To emancipate woman is not only to open the gates of the university, the law courts or the parliaments to her, for the ‘emancipated’ woman will always throw domestic toil on to another woman. To emancipate woman is to free her from the brutalizing toil of the kitchen and wash-house; it is to organize your household in such a way as to enable her to rear her children, if she be so minded, while retaining sufficient leisure to take her share of social life.”

“I can easily imagine belonging to one man for my entire life, but he would have to be a whole man, a man who would dominate me, who would subjugate me by his inate strength. And every man—I know this very well—as soon as he falls in love becomes weak, pliable, ridiculous. He puts himself into the woman's hands, kneels down before her. The only man whom I could love permanently would be he before whom I should have to kneel.”