Revolution In Writing

A Poem About Gaddafi.

I am really really awful at coming up with poetry names; it’s really quite embarrassing. But I won’t try and pretend I can, because that’ll just be worse. I wrote this, inspired by Greek mythology characters Icarus and his father (look them up it’s quite interesting… or so I think anyway!) It’s about Gaddafi. He isn’t really worth a whole poem… though I assure you it’s not flattering.

Dearest Icarus, watch your betrothed fail your father
She is falling; like the dust off an unscathed drifter-
Reading her grace. There is no power in ignorance
There is but a plunging sting in the sun’s just cause
Your hideous ambition precedes you, like the rays of

Your doubtless commands. You dance on the strings
Of your jovial sadness; “There is nothing stable in
The world; uproar is your only music”- so continue
Your prance and drift along your determined paths
And hopes to strive in conquering the fiery beast skies

Their gates will decline you; in all your shameful glory
You feed the bullets; and bury the bones like juvenile
Plants. They will not grow; the sun does not glow.
You will join them; with a noose comforting your sins
And your tears, watering your fears like wild thyme.

You spread your false wings and lie to the heavens
Like slandering Daedalus in all his majestic state-
He weeps at the sight of your tattered feathers; you
Are decaying like Dorian’s face. The putrid masses
Escorting your decorum to the fiery pit of your ancestors

And they lay. They lay waiting in rows of planted souls.
Their smiles are decaying like compost. But their eyes will
Gape. They gape like acrimonious priests with unholy deeds
At their doorsteps; and will you fail- like others before you?
We shall plant your soul; beside your heir and let you gloat.

O Icarus, how sweet is your downfall. Your melted wax
And dying might is crumbling like the walls you built with
Theft of virtue. Call the foes of our guardians and let them
Honour your discharge from this forsaken life you have owned
Do not doubt; there will be bells ringing at your petty defeat.

By Rukaya El-Turki

WarLiterature&Mourning: The contribution of Literature to the process of mourning

Mourning is most commonly associated with the grieving over a death of someone; however, it is also applicable to the anniversary of the passing of an important event, individual or occasion. There is no way to avoid pain completely, but we can find ways to cope, become stronger and eventually find peace. Dealing with death is a process we all endure at some time in our lives. One message or notification of death cannot stand on its own as memories and thoughts rush through our minds in a flurry of emotion.
In all walks of life, people have devised ways to help cope with the inevitability of loss, either of someone we know or an event that affects the majority, as with war. In all lifestyles, releasing inner emotions is the best way to open your mind and allow grief to subside; and thus it is commonly known that through time literature has contributed immensely to the process of mourning.
When understanding evocative poetry and prose; the segregation between the brutal reality of the world around us and the hopeful imagination is evident. Meandering through crowds of the mind and across obstructions of problematic thought as one’s victorious imagination triumphs over the weak and frail logic is literature in its simplest form. Literature processes the thoughts of individuals, into an understandable state, interpreted by many. From this, we can understand that literature is vital; a part of every individual’s process of peace and tranquility as it speaks the minds of the world in mourning, and in happiness.
But can literature speak the grief of multitudes powerfully and simply enough to be heard by the multitudes for which it speaks? For surely if it were mourning in a spirit that consoles the soul and actions of its audience the contribution to a logical state of mind allows the process of mourning to generate over a ‘reasoning’ debate between poetry, prose and its companion.
From the generation of ancient Greek and Roman poets, to those of the 19th Century; poetry has been a means to glorify war and mourn the lives lost. Expressing honour, courage and patriotism; war poetry has become one of the most fascinating aspects of literature, affecting everyone, and thus consoling a grieving public looking for the sound of reason and a manner for grief. The deeply expressive Psalm, “By the waters of Babylon , there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion ” expresses grief of exile. The line, Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori from Wilfred Owen expressing how sweet it is to die for one’s country; is reminiscent of Horace, the Roman poet. “No inferno would now melt them, no storm destroys, because they had seen the worst and they had survived”. Sebastian Faulks creates a sense of happiness and hope for those who served in the war, expressing the soldiers in a positive light allowing readers to create a mental state which although stimulates ones expressive grief, it is suggestive of a positive outcome, and every reader will view the light at the end of the tunnel.
For we see throughout decades and centuries of time, mourning has become a part of literature’s spine, allowing authors, poets and audiences to reconcile with themselves. It is as suggested not only the audience which benefits from literature, but authors are inspired to mourn upon a grieving piece. Pat Barker’s Regeneration is not only a vivid evocation of the agony of the First World War, but the multi-layered exploration of all wars, challenging assumptions about relationships during the war helps surface the mourning element in which she has assisted in easing. By working jointly with Owen and Sassoon’s poetry, the aim towards the common goal to raise awareness for a grieving public is achieved.
When looking at Sebastian Faulks’ Birdsong; it tells a story of a man; Stephen Wraysford at different stages in his life before the war and during the war. It jointly focuses on the life of Stephen’s granddaughter Elizabeth, and her attempts to find out more about her grandfather’s experiences in World War I. Through this, the ability to understand the war through the episodic structure which moves between three different periods of time, allows the reader to submit his literary retelling of the events and attitudes towards the Battle of the Somme and life in the trenches. Faulks’ use of Elizabeth ’s character demonstrates the disarrayed public, searching for evidence that comforts; which answers questions left unanswered and explanations left unsaid.
But also through war literature, there is hope and its birth, quite literally in the form of babies born to women and sired by men who, for unfathomable reasons, felt that they cannot articulate exult in the birth of their children. The narrative links such births across the generations. As in the opening passage of another great novel of the First World War, Hemingway’s “A Farewell to Arms”, the image of pregnancy is engaged in the description of a troop of heavily armed men traipsing to the next killing field - a presage of death; later, an unsought and unwanted pregnancy results in death. Faulks, no more than Hemingway, does not attempt to make “points” in his novel, but the birth of children in Birdsong is seen always as redemptive, especially the present-day birth at the conclusion, described as it is from the perspective of the women. Several times Stephen emerges from near entombment in the military tunnels of the front line, experiencing a virtual rebirth into the world of light and air. This, although doesn’t suggest the horrific war was a positive thing, highlights the mournful ‘hope’ which those who served experienced; the humanity lies within literature’s ability to express such brutal events in the lightest and friendliest form without forgetting the cruel detail.
Therefore, it is arguable that literature offers potential healing. There are poems that may offer company, or that may invite us to look at the world in new ways. Siegfried Sassoon’s poem; On Passing the New Menin Gate encourages the reader to respond, urging an emotional upheaval in ones conscience. Sassoon’s polite interrogation begins from the first line. “Who will remember, passing through this gate, the unheroic dead who fed the guns?” He cries. The Menin gate war memorial at Ypres was built to commemorate the British Soldiers whose bodies were never found. Indeed Wilfred Owens’ poem, ‘Dulce Et Decorum’ was a passionate denunciation of war and death in the war but Siegfried Sassoon appears passionate and angry; a denunciation of the way in which the war dead are remembered. He derides the idea that even for grandest memorials in any way recompense “the poor bloody infantry” for providing cannon fodder – and particularly these men, listed as ‘missing’ or ‘presumed dead’, whose ‘intolerably nameless’ bones are still being turned up by farmers’ ploughs in Flanders to this day.
The poem attacks the false way brutally killed soldiers are remembered as if they were heroes who were happy to die for their country. Officially the state remembers them with ‘pomp’. In reality they died ‘unvictorious’, ‘unheroic’, and as ‘nameless’ men without individual graves. The repetition of ‘Dead’ suggests that the individuals who gave their lives will not be remembered. Sassoon compares the location of the New Menin Gate with the original setting of the marshy battleground of The Salient.
Sassoon’s grieving and hopeful message created from the allusion from Ecclesiasticus of c200AD, “their bodies are buried in peace; but their name liveth for evermore” is extracted from a well known passage beginning “Let us now praise famous men, and also observes, some there be which have no memorial; who are perished as though they had never been”. There is a mood like that at a funeral ceremony as the poem is like a funeral speech at the monument, demonstrating mourning in its obvious form. The poet focuses on the horror of battle; emphasizing ‘foulness’ and ‘endured’. The hyperbolized ‘Sepulchre of crime’ suggests that the monument is like a war crime as it dishonours the memory of the dead.
Sassoon feels that the war leaders betrayed the ordinary soldier. They were treated as targets, ‘feed’, for the guns. Their ending was ‘foul’, rather than heroic as often claimed. The monument ‘belied’ or used their deaths in a false way to glorify British government or British history. From the start they were betrayed as they were ‘conscripted’: they were forced or tricked into joining the army. But their life was one of brief endurance of horror in a ‘sullen swamp’. Sassoon sums up their lives as soldiers as a struggle in ‘the slime’. This is not as grand and heroic as the monument would like their relatives to think. Sassoon feels exceptionally angry at the betrayal that he envisages the dead soldiers rising up in revolt against the false monument. He concludes with the angry image that the monument is a crime against the memory of the dead.
In the four long and terrible years of the war, ‘the dead’- once John McCrae’s imaginary summoners to vengeance, are now envisaged by Sassoon as posthumously contemptuous of the value which the living place on ‘a pile of peace-complacent stone’. Sassoon’s poetry is a reminder that people should never be complacent about peace. The constant work needed to maintain it as important as the work to achieve it. In that light the constant tending of the world’s war cemeteries has become a sad and painful allegory. The possibility to grieve for soldiers without being patriotically inspired by them and without presented them as sacred martyrs is proven to be possible. Sassoon’s difficult message is mind-provoking, allowing the memory of the soldiers to be expressed vividly; but demonstrates anger as many have felt concerning the monument. The ability to come to terms with the sixty-thousand unknown losses through the work of poetry ensures that this number is looked upon as a reality, rather than the expected statistic.
It is clear that both men have strong opinions on the war and aim to share this with their readers. Sassoon even declared that his aim in writing was not to create poetry but to describe the full horrors of war. One way in which both writers achieve this is by appealing to the senses. Through detailed of descriptions of sights, sounds, smell and touch they create overwhelming images of the very scenes that soldiers would have been a part of. Sassoon’s use of alliteration and rhetorically styled questions, helps to create these lucid images, as seen in the line, ‘As these intolerably nameless names?’ in ‘On Passing the New Menin Gate’ Similarly, Faulks enhances his descriptions with similar appeals to the senses, ‘the bombardment was not much to begin with; it was like a clearing of the throat, but the echoes went on and on over the soft download, on a ringing bass note.’ As a result, the reader is taken closer to the action and is able to imagine such horrors implicitly. It could be argued that the horrors described in Sassoon’s poetry are more explicit because we are aware that he was an eventual casualty of the war.
It is not only Sassoon’s work but neither Faulks nor Owen shy away from displaying the harsh realities of conflict, with ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’ focusing on descriptions of the physical horrors of a soldier dying from gas inhalation and Birdsong regularly describing shocking fatal wounds. By using narratives from the frontline both writers are able to show the real truth of the war with such detail that as readers, we are shocked. The emotion of shock, one of the component feelings of horror, goes some way to enabling us to understand the images of war presented. Owen and Faulks can be seen as similar in their alliance with soldiers on the battlefields, as opposed to the politics of the war as a whole.
Faulks expresses sympathy and grief through the character Jack Firebrace in Birdsong as he shows sympathy towards the horses used in the war, on the grounds that they did not ask for any part in it. There is clearly a link between this sympathy and the feelings that the main character of Stephen eventually has for his troops; his men have not personally asked to become a part of the war, yet they are forced to give their lives to it or have their futures modeled by it.
Birdsongs demonstration of the experience of trench warfare is made extremely vivid. Faulks does not give any gratification to any sensibilities in his descriptions of the mutilation but indeed provides the reader an insight into the pain of the war. The detail helps console the reader opening new routes of thought for its audience, rather than ignoring a poignant but true reality.
Different types of grief are associated with different styles of literature. The first form is denial; looking for a former spouse in familiar places and not accepting or even acknowledging the loss. Anger is expressed predominately in Sassoon and Owen’s work, as they express their feeling of wanting to fight back and get even with pain. Although the next two stages of Bargaining and Depression are not offered in Sassoon’s work it is evidently shown in Faulks’ ‘Birdsong’ as the France 1916 section suggests that Stephen should not tell his men that the attack at Hawthorne Ridge will fail but to pray for them instead. He is essentially bargaining with God which stimulates his guilt and forms depression of the lives lost. At this point in the novel, Stephen feels lonely and writes to Isabelle, feeling that he has no one else that he can express his feelings to; and thus reinforces the idea that literature contributes to the process of mourning.
The final stage of grief – acceptance although isn’t demonstrated in Sassoon’s poem but Faulks’ Novel declares the acceptance in the last section of England 1979 as Elizabeth names her child after John, as promised over sixty years ago by Stephen. Sassoon’s poem presents the Anger and struggle of coming to terms with the effects of the first world war; clearly suggesting that the poetry was written at a time when Sassoon was grieving, allowing himself to move onto the next stage of grief.
This therefore clearly demonstrates that literature’s contribution to the process of mourning has been effective in consoling a grieving public throughout decades and centuries. From the revelation of the bible, to the painful truth of the First World War; the effects of words and honesty on a blank page has come to relieve an element of pain and isolation; as grief is shared and openly discussed. It is through this that pain is demolished, and individuals are able to see hope and happiness. The process of mourning is assisted through works of literature; as evident with war poetry and prose. The popularity of such poems has raised awareness throughout a grieving public hoping to understand the historical events of wars, and wars to come.

Libyans & ‘Their Extra Baggage’

Our wonderful country is almost completely liberated. Let’s not forget; the fact Tripoli is free and the green goblins of today are burning in the sub-saharan suns in the middle of our beautiful desert sands (littering- we must do something about that soon) there still remains a little work that needs to be done. Nevertheless; families in Tripoli are returning from all over the world; those who have fled due to the situation in the past 6 months, and those who have fled due to the BIG situation of those 42- dismal years.

I’m making a dent in the packing situation. Being Libyan means one simple rule must always be implemented. Pack weeksbefore you travel. Overweight luggage is our forte. It’s in our blood. It’s incomprehensibly something you cannot avoid, no matter how large your suitcase is, no matter how early you begin your packing venture- it’s going to happen.

Leaving Tripoli was harder than going back. We’re leaving under war-time circumstances; light packing ought to be our top priority; and ofcourse it was. Me and my three siblings were summoned for a family meeting pre-packing. We’re sat there, being drilled by our circumstantially serious parents. We are nodding; there is for once, no disagreement at this assembly.

And so it began, I was certain I didn’t need any clothes- at this point I had convinced myself that we weren’t going to be gone for longer than 2 weeks. Tripoli would be liberated as soon as we’re in Tunisia. There won’t be any need to travel further. I pack a very limited amount of clothes (for once) and I am perfectly content with the space remaining in my suitcase.

I zip it up and move it to the land-of-the-suitcases. Our living room now looked like a laundrette. Clothes being ironed (why do they insist on ironing clothes?) clothes being folded, shoes wrapped in plastic bags etc it’s all happening. Our suitcases are lying there like open coffins waiting to be sealed.

The next morning; I return to double-check the contents of my suitcase. I want to make sure I’ve not forgotten anything. I open it up- wait a second, is this even my suitcase? Why is there a saucepan lid in here? And all these tea-towels?

Yes; it was her.

I’m still rummaging through; I think she just gathered all the containers of the ‘bharaat’ in the kitchen cupboard and just threw them into my suitcase. Do we need kirwiya wa koosboor? Do we really need kamoon 7oot? Really? For a moment I think she may have packed some Gambri fish in here too. Ya allah. Why are there cans of Tuna. WHY.

Oh my god. She’s packed the gideed! There is more food in here than there are clothes. I can’t even see my clothes! Hold on- where the hell are my clothes? That’s it. The final straw. I belt out; mama!

I think she knew it was coming. She makes her way up the stairs with a smirk on her face as if she had already rehearsed this moment. I don’t even need to speak- she said my clothes are in a different suitcase. She needed to pack the essentials; so carelessly, as to not make me freak out even more than I already had.

Since when were herbs a critical element of evacuation?

Why am I finding tuna cans instead of my jeans?

Why o why did you need to bring Tungrat Al-Kiskaas with you? We don’t want cooscoosi or rishta, wallahi, it’s fine!

Is the 3isaadat albazeen in here cause you wanna beat us up in England? Or you actually planning on making Bazeen every Friday as usual?

Questions. That will never have an answer but- “Ani n3raf what I’m doing!”

So khalas, the conversation ends there. We don’t discuss this anymore; the weight problem remains questionable to when we arrive at the airport.

So we are now at the airport; we’ve pretended to generally understand the weight of our suitcases on the normal scales we have in the bathroom. Any outrageous numbers were dealt with; we may have had to reduce the Honey Jars from 6 to 4. The olive oil had to be eliminated (it was between that and the ‘Roob’).

We’re stood waiting with all our luggage in the queue. I am constantly questioning how we managed to get all this luggage to the airport. There are somany bags here; I feel ashamed to say I have just come out of Tripoli.

Then the moment of truth; the most apprehensive moment of anxiety; my dad grabs the first bag and slowly places it on the metal weight-checking conveyor belt. Our faces all lean towards the number that jumps from 60 and slowly going down, down, down, it’s finally settled on a number.

Our faces are relieved; it’s 100g under limit. The staff member looks at us awkwardly; wondering why we were so on edge. It doesn’t stop there- we continue to pull these faces until we’re assured all of our things have slowly drifted away behind the rubber-certain.

Our agony is over, we may rest.

Mama pulls a face at me- ‘I toldyou it’ll be fine!’

And walks away.

Our New-Born Dawn

Words aren’t enough to describe the emotions we’ve felt in the past couple of weeks. They have been filled with overwhelming happiness, joy, sorrow and disbelief. There has been alot lost, alot gained, and alot learned from the six months that all people alike have seen.
Everytime I come to write, I feel that I won’t do justice how I and many others feel. So I put the pen down, and walk away. I hope I’ve done it justice.

The fiery pit of our friend Libertas
Burns in the hearts of our fulsome spirits
She holds our heads pride in crowds of gold
Our dreams are sewn;

In the kites she claims her own
With a fist of valiant courage and a heart
Even more her own; than it deemed to be
In her spoken legacy.

She flaunts her smiles, her audacious beauty
In all the glistening eyes that meet
In that beloved heartland we call our home.
Our fiery pit-

Our place of calm waters.
Once a shelter, of vices and sin
A courteous building; of wicked lies and filth
The locket to our lives; the sanctuary of our pain

But one howl; one clout from the hearts-
Our homeland is calling; and we are all awaken.
The final hour cried for the almighty. We cry;
In unison we cry. In unison they descend-

In God’s name; they draw their fists
And anchor their souls in raging steps they take
From the deepest of the desert sands;
To the highest of mountain peeks-

We are called as one-
Libertas holds us, in her shielding arms of candid
Strengths and bounty love; showering our tears
With unified hands and unified hearts.

She steps on Mediterranean waters;
And watches the beauty unfold from afar-
Her splendid eyes torn at the end of an Odyssey;
The dawn of a new day has come.

By Rukaya El-Turki

A Tale From Tripoli

A breezy night in April,
A night I will never forget.

In our home, my Uncle and his family over for the night, we huddled around the TV, trying to configure Libya AlAhrar. Everyone was so excited that finally AlAhrar was available on Nilesat. It felt like Free Libya was drawing closer, and we had a piece of it in our living rooms.

It felt good, it felt rebellious. I imagined myself like Winston Smith from George Orwell’s masterpiece ‘1984’. His character keeps a journal of negative thoughts about the government, the party and ‘Big Brother’, which, if uncovered by the ‘Thought Police’, would warrant his death.
We were all Winston Smiths, hiding in our homes, betraying the government, with a ‘Thought Police’ on our consciences.
We spent hours, flicking through the usual route. All the news channels listed in one favourites list; Aljazeera Arabic, Aljazeera English, Aljazeera Mubasher, Alarabiya, France 24, Al-Aan, Al-Hiwar, Al-Hurra, CNN, Sky news, BBC Arabic, BBC world news, AlAhrar, and right at the end, Libyan, state, TV.
Hours, and hours of news a day, we were all so aware of everything that was happening in the world. Never has any Libyan sat and watched the news 24/7, eagerly waiting for fresh ‘breaking news’. NATO struck that night, around 12:30am. Two minutes later, breaking news on Al-Arabiya:- “4 explosions in Bab-Alaziziya”. They were so loud, the windows rattled, we all involuntarily ducked, as if it were over our heads. Smoke ascended into the air- yes they definitely hit something tonight.
We return to our trusted positions, kids on the carpet, adults on the sofas, and we wait for more. An hour passes; nothing.
My uncle decides he wants to go outside, he’s had enough waiting for more, he needs a smoke.
I follow him out to the veranda, and I’m stunned by the silence of the high street tonight. It was only 1:30am. I remembered the days when the cars would drift on the main road, all the shabab on the streets, shops open, Tripoli was alive and well. But since 21st February, it was a ghost town.

I was lost in this daydream; awaken from my thoughts by an unusual sound.
There was a gentle tap on the glass of the metal door.
I step forward; I’m presuming there’s a cat or something walking past. But it didn’t stop, systematic tapping. I call my uncle over, and I can see a shadow, someone’s finger, tapping on the glass.
He calls out.
A murmur, someone yelling, but their voice was broken.

He calls out again, who on earth is this, at 2:00am?

A pained voice replies. “Open the door, please, open the door…”

At this point, I’ve distinguished it’s a female.

We open the door, and suddenly the lady falls on me, her legs loose, and her weight collapsed into my arms. She yelled out to me, I can’t stand up, I can’t stand up. Her fingers clawed into my skin. I felt her pain, her nails, deepened into my shoulders.

I drag her over to the steps.

She’s still holding onto me, I hug her, completely unaware of what had just happened, what got her here, why was she so distraught. Her face pale, beaten, inflated. Her arms trembling, her strength had died, she had nothing in her. Just dry tears.

I cried with her. I felt I knew what had happened. She didn’t speak a word for a good few minutes. I said nothing. I clung onto this stranger, like a familiar friend, slowly easing her pain. Waiting for her to come alive again.

What was her story?

She was in her home. Cooking lunch for her family, talking to her friend about the cutlery she bought last week. The door rings, someone says he has a parcel for her. She opens the door, and she’s dragged into a car by a stranger. I’m sure you can guess who. They threw her on the streets, with nothing.

People don’t share everything with a stranger, but it was enough that she said she was beaten, tortured, spat on and humiliated. What was her crime? Nothing.

Now, I wish it ended there.

Her family contacted the police. Yes, the police. Reported a kidnap, and waited all day for something. This lady rang her family to come and take her home.

Her family came with the police.

A vicious circle right there- the same people, who kidnapped her, came to take her home. They of course, blamed the ‘Gurdaan’ for the kidnap.

People don’t believe what happens in Tripoli when you tell them. But this night, proved to me that these things happen, to anyone. It could’ve been me, it could’ve been my friends. First hand experience is nothing like the stories you hear. When you see someone suffering, when you have the marks on your shoulders for weeks, reminding you, you know it’s real.

Many people say to me they wouldn’t have risked it.
But I’m glad I was there to help this lady.

Our Finale

Quick poem, I’m way too excited to come up with something better (sorry), and I NEVER write poetry like this, this is a first for me. But then again, Libya doesn’t get freed everyday.

We’ve watched the sky
Like watching a painting
Our fears are alive
We’ll watch for the changing

The times in a rush
The time needs erasing
We’ve timed all of it
And now we’ll be waiting

You’ve fought for it all
You’ll fight for the taking
You’re fighting for us
And we’ll do the praying

The Success Of Gaddafi… And Imminent Downfall

Niccolo Machiavelli, one of the most influential philosophers to those whose aim in life is to gain power, and plant roots in their societies. Hitler learned from him, Mussolini studied him and Gaddafi, well, tried to follow his guide book. How to maintain everlasting power by any means, in his famous book ‘The Prince’, Aka a step by step manual on how to become a successful tyrant.

When we study history, we look at sources, we look at accounts and influences that drove tyrants to do those things. Why did Hitler implement ethnic cleansing to cause the holocaust? Why did Mussolini’s fascist state prove to be so radical and violent? Why does Gaddafi believe it’s acceptable to kill his own people?

In his book, Machiavelli talks about the methodology and personal characteristic traits a ‘Prince’ should acquire in order to have an enduring political structure. To maintain such power, Machiavelli teaches that the ‘Prince’ should put his image first, his reputation, but simultaneously he must be willing to act immorally at any costs; be it force, deceit or just common ruthlessness. But Machiavelli didn’t stop there, he emphasised the ‘methodical’ need to exercise this force, making the population accustomed to violence and oppression- a ritual attempt of implanting torture into daily lives of citizens.

See the similarities? Abu Sleem Massacre 1996. Ramadan hangings 1986. HIV case, constant killings, imprisonment, the list goes on, all a ploy, all a tactic to control the masses.

“I consider those are able to support themselves by their own resources who can, either by abundance of men or money, raise a sufficient army to join battle against any one who comes to attack them; and I consider those always to have need of others who cannot show themselves against the enemy in the field, but are forced to defend themselves by sheltering behind walls.”

Machiavelli would have approved of Gaddafi’s rise to and consolidation of power; he would reject Gaddafi’s later tactics and attribute them to his demise. Gaddafi’s attempt to create his own master-plan of absolute power is slowly falling through the roof.

Machiavelli talked a lot about how “the ends justify the means” meaning that harsh and cruel actions are okay for a leader to take if the end result ends up being beneficial to the “Nation”. The Definition of ‘nation’ gets lost in translation from a dictators point of view. Gaddafi’s harshness and cruelty were never towards the nations ‘greatness’. It was purely a benefactor for his self, rather than the good of the common people.

Gaddafi went wrong when he ignored Machiavelli’s principle:

“To rule your citizens through intimidation is inefficient. To inspire them, and lead them forward with their genuine support will maximize our national capabilities.”

Machiavelli said that a prince should achieve a virtuous and stable state by all means that prove necessary. Above all, a prince should not be hated in the process. Gaddafi’s attempt at creating a ‘People’s Republic’ and presenting himself as a loved ‘Messiah’ was successful to some extent. On the one hand, he rallied supporters that worshipped him and his ideologies to the extremities. But on the other hand, his unequal use of Machiavelli’s principles created a split in the rift for his master-plan. His drive of evil overran his thinking and thus, ignoring Machiavelli’s emphasised point that he should not be hated. Clearly, that went very, very wrong.

When comparing Gaddafi to his tyrannical friends, the resemblance is uncanny. Stalin Killed to preserve his power. An unjustified monster. Hitler’s enjoyment of murder and desire of cruelty puts him as the compassionate monster. While Gaddafi remains to be the inhumane, heart of stone monster with a zero-tolerance rate for anything beside his self-love.

Machiavelli stated:

“He who holds his State by means of mercenary troops can never be solidly or securely seated. For such troops are disunited, ambitious, insubordinate, treacherous, insolent among friends, cowardly before foes, and without fear of God or faith with man. Whenever they are attacked defeat follows; so that in peace you are plundered by them, in war by your enemies. And this because they have no tie or motive to keep them in the field beyond their paltry pay.”

‘The Prince’ was definitely accurate in its pages, but tyrants tend to ignore advices that get in the way of their plans, or when they believe there is no other option. Gaddafi my dear, you should’ve followed your guidebook.

I’ll leave the rest for rhetorical purposes. I strongly recommend you to try and get a copy of ‘The Prince’. It is one of my favourite books, one that explains many happenings in the world of political tyrants.