For almost thirty years, Muammar Qaddafi has blended Arab nationalism, revolutionary socialism and Islamic orthodoxy in an original and provocative way, only to be accused of many misdeeds by the world powers.
History shall, in due time, cast some more light on a leader who his countrymen affectionately call "The Guide," a man who restored pride to the Libyan masses.

As Pierre Salinger notes in his introduction: "things are changing in Libya£. Another fact is equally striking. For the past few years Muammar Qaddafi has become more reclusive and has taken the habit of frequently withdrawing into his tent, in the desert, in order to meditate, study and … write!
Statesmen are known to resort to the services of ghost-writers. This is not the case for Muammar Qaddafi, who insists on holding the quill personally. My task as a publisher is to bring out new literary talents. I sincerely think we have here an original Middle Eastern thinker whose ideas flow from the ever-developing and conflicting reality in search of what is best and most beautiful. (Alain Stanké New York,)
For almost three decades, western audiences have seen Muammar Qaddafi as a provocative, defiant, fiery head of state. He has often been accused of condoning terrorism and financing extremist groups. Major powers have tried to eradicate his regime through embargoes and even a bombing operation during which one of Qaddafi's children was killed.

In the present texts, aside from the views of a revolutionary and a prophet, we discover Qaddafi as a writer and an essayist. The short stories and essays in this book are more revealing about Qaddafi's vision of the world than all of his addresses and the articles and reports that have been written about him during the last 25 years.

"Even though the great majority of the world's English-speaking population is convinced that Libya is a hazardous or unsafe country and that Muammar Qaddafi is a dangerous leader, they should read this book. It is significant because it gives a very special view about an original mentality, one that is certainly not available in the western media." (Pierre Salinger, journalist and writer)
"These texts faithfully reflect the multi-faced personality of Muammar Qaddafi. Qaddafi as a Bedouin from the Great Desert, as a man of faith, as a politician, as a thinker, as a moralist, as a reformer, as a poet." (Guy Georgy, First French Ambassador in Libya and writer)

Muammar Qaddafi was born in 1942. he became an army officer in 1965. in 1969, he formed a revolutionary committee and led a successful coup against the monarchy of Idris el-Mehdi.
The new Libyan leader nationalized all foreign petroleum assets and reinstituted the ancient Qu'ranic Law, which he adapted to the times. In 1980, he published The Green Book, a treatise on Islamic socialism that heralded the start of the era of the Jamahiriya or "State of the masses" and inaugurated an economic and social revolution.
In 1986, the United States sought to quell Qaddafi's alleged terrorist activities by bombing several sites in Libya. Qaddafi survived but one of his children was killed.

Muammar Quaddafi's short stories and essays ook are more revealing about his vision of the world than all of his addresses and the articles and reports that have been written about him during the last 25 years, and this is one of his revealing and highly expressive short stories entitled the earth:

You can leave everything, except the earth. The earth is the only thing you cannot do without. If you destroy other things, you might not lose out, but beware of destroying the earth, because you will then lose everything! The source of biological life, at which human life stands at the top, is food. The earth is the container for this nourishment, which comes in different types... solid, fluid, gaseous. The earth is its container, so do not break the only con- tainer we have, for which there is no substitute. If you destroy agricultural land, for example, it is as if you are destroying the only vessel containing your food, without which you will not be able to consume it. If you destroy agricultural land, it is as if you are destroying the only vessel containing your drink, for which there is no other receptacle, so how will you be able to consume it? The earth is the lung through which you breathe, so if you destroy it, you will have no way to breathe. If the rain falls down upon you without having land, you will not benefit at all. Therefore, the sky has no value for us without our having land.

If oxygen is found somewhere in outer space, what is the benefit if there is no earth? All of history's conflicts throughout the ages have been led by man against man, or against nature, have been about land. Land has been the crux of the conflict. Even space has been used for the sake of land. Truly, the earth is your mother; she gave birth to you from her insides. She is the one who nursed you and fed you. Do not be dis- obedient to your mother -- and do not shear her hair, cut off her limbs, rip her flesh, or wound her body. You must only trim her nails, make her body clean of dirt or filth. Give her medicine to cure any disease. Do not place great weights above her breast, weights of mud or stone above her ribs. Respect her, and remem-
ber that if you are too harsh with her, you will not find another. Sweep the accumulated iron, mud, and stone from her back. Relieve her of the burdens that others have placed on her unfairly. Revere the cradle in which you grew up, the lap in which you lay. Do not destroy your final resting-place, your place of refuge, or you are the losers[11] and you shall truly regret it.[12]

Land remains land only if we preserve its bounty. Land that is bountiful is truly useful land -- guard it well. If we lay tile or pave it, build upon it, we will have killed it, and it will no longer give us its bounty. It will then become merely tile or asphalt, concrete or marble. And these things do not give us
anything. They do not grow plants or give us water; they are useful to neither man nor animal. The earth will then have died. Do not kill the earth -- do not kill your very life. The earth is water and nourishment, and the dead land that has been covered by buildings and construction does not give this water and nour-ishment. Thus, there is no life upon a dead earth. What kind of people are they who kill the earth and bury it alive? Upon what kind of land will their life depend afterwards? Where will they live, and where will they obtain their food and drink? The earth is something for which there is no alternative, so whither then are you going?[13] In heaven there are trees, and not roads, sidewalks, public squares or buildings. Ruining the earth is its misuse, its trans-formation into something other than land good for producing water and food. Thus, those who turn agricultural land into land that cannot grow any - thing are the ones who spoil this land.[14]
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NOTES:

11. Implicit reference to many verses; especially Sura 5, verse 30;
Sura 2, verse 27; Sura 103, verse 2.

12. As in to become "repentant"; Quran, Sura 5, verse 31.

13. Quran, Sura 81, verse 26.

14. Quran, Sura 18, verse 94.