In each episode of our podcast “Life in Seven Songs,” we ask the world’s brightest minds and leaders: What songs tell the story of your life?
This week’s guest is Sarah Shourd, an American writer, educator, and activist who spent 410 days in solitary confinement as a political hostage in Iran. Her experience drove her to become a leading voice against mass incarceration and prison isolation.
During Shourd’s incarceration, music was a source of strength. “Once I started to let my guard down and realized that the women guards were not going to hurt me and that we were in a section where the male guards couldn’t come, I danced naked, I made music on the walls, and I would sing so loud that the guards would barge in and tell me to be quiet,” she recalled. “I would just sing louder.”
Growing up in Chicago with a single mother who escaped an abusive relationship, Shourd’s earliest memories are scored to Tracy Chapman’s “She’s Got Her Ticket,” which became the anthem of their cross-country trek to California. “The world exploded for me,” Shourd said of that journey. “I remember it in vibrant color.”
As a teen in California, Shourd was enthralled by Rage Against the Machine’s “Killing in the Name,” attending concerts where she could “lose my mind in the best possible way” in mosh pits. This rebellious energy stayed with her through college at UC Berkeley, when 9/11 became a turning point that launched her into full-force anti-war activism.
Through this work, she met journalist Shane Bauer. After traveling around the world, the couple — both journalists — settled in Damascus, Syria, where Shourd was studying Arabic. In 2009, while hiking in Kurdistan with a friend, Josh Fattal, they were captured at gunpoint near an unmarked Iranian border.
During her darkest moments in solitary confinement, Shourd defiantly sang Mercedes Sosa’s “Gracias a la Vida” and Seal’s “Crazy,” with the lyrics: “We’re never gonna survive unless we get a little crazy.” She was released in September 2010, a year before Bauer and Fattal. When they were freed, her feelings were best captured by Etta James’ “At Last.” “It was almost like I couldn’t give myself permission to feel joy until they were free,” she says.
While recovering from the trauma of her ordeal, Shourd connected with the plight of those in solitary confinement in U.S. prisons. Kendrick Lamar’s “Element” captures her determination: “I want to slap the prison system in the face, but I’m going to do it with art.” This resilience fueled her 2016 play “The Box,” about prisoners organizing after an inmate’s suicide.
Listen to Shourd’s playlist on Spotify, and find a transcript of the podcast episode here. Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at lifeinsevensongs@sfstandard.com.