The recently released Complete Works of Poetry by Sayed Qutb presents a different picture of the man who was executed by the Nasser regime in 1966 due to his radical Islamist ideas.

Qubt is revealed in this collection as both a literary critic and a poet whose works and legacy should be protected.  

The book's editor, Aly Abdel-Rahman, worked for 17 years on the project and is convinced people will rethink their view on Qubt after reading his poetry.

In 1995 Abdel-Rahman presented his Masters thesis on Qubt's journalism to Al-Azhar University but it was rejected. He recently learned that no research has been submitted on Qubt since then.

In an interview with Ahram Online, Abdel-Rahman said people should re-examine Qubt's philosophy and poetry from before he became a radical.  

"We have to rediscover him for the coming generations who have to know that Sayed Qutb wasn't born an extremist as some would claim, but had a creative past," Abdel-Rahman said.

Most of the material collected in the book was originally published in newspapers and magazines, including Al-Balagh, Al-Ahram, Al-Osbo', Al-Adeeb and the Muslim Brotherhood Periodical.

Abdel-Rahman discovered that most of the poems published in literary magazines were hidden in archives that had to deny any link to Qutb after his death.

The book includes poems published from 1924 until just before his death. The poems are organised chronologically by publishing date, aiming to track Qutb's poetic development and the different phases of his thought.

An admirer of Qutb, Abdel-Rahman wants people to read Qutb the creative writer who loved Egypt and wanted to reform society.

The idea that Qutb rejected his past after joining the Muslim Brotherhood is rejected by Abdel-Rahman, who confirms that Qutb never requested that his poetry books be burned.

Furthermore, Qubt's brother, Mohamed, welcomed the idea of publishing the collection, and his brother-in-law came from Paris to review the work before it to print. In addition, the work was reviewed by three professors of literature, plus his fellow prisoner Sheikh Abdel-Sattar Fathallah.

The poetry was published without censorship, expect for three sections from one poem upon the request of Mohamed Qubt, and the novel Thorns, which was to be included in a soon to be published collection of his literary works.

According to Abdel-Rahman, Qubt rejected the publication of Thorns because it shows the romantic side of Qutb:

"I explained to them that taking out parts of the poems won't render this truly a complete collection and will damage research into his work. I also told them that Qutb isn't owned by his family or the Muslim Brotherhood. There are 152 Masters and PhD theses on Qutb, including in the USA. I told them there's nothing that defames Sayed Qutb, for his literature is of a high literary and ethical standard even at the height of its romance. He spoke of his beloved with deep respect, and when he saw something in her he didn't like, he just turned his eyes away."

It is important to note that Thorns was published by the General Egyptian Book Organisation last year, with an introduction by poet Shaaban Youssef.

Abdel-Rahman found Qutb's poetry to be a support for the theory that literary work must serve the issues of society, as his work between 1930 and 1945 tackled the issues of poetry, illiteracy and ignorance.

Abdel-Rahman visited Mohamed Badie, the Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, who welcomed the publication of the book and said, "It's not correct at all that [the creative and poetic works of Sayed Qutb be destroyed], for creativity is what led him to Islamic thought."

The collection includes the poem The Unknown Shore, published in 1935 and never published again, which existed in only two remaining copies, one at the American University in Cairo and the other at London University.

There are 35 poems not previously published in books, collected from newspapers and periodicals by the researcher.

The annex includes some articles by contemporaries, such as the critics Mohamed Mandour and Hassan Ismail and the poets Abdellatif Abdel-Halim and Abdel-Baky Hussein.

In the introduction, Taher Makky says Qutb stopped writing poetry in order to focus on the battle taking place in Egyptian culture between Westernisation and the retention of an Arab and Islamic identity, and the turning point in Qubt's life was when he visited the US.  

Abdel-Rahman concluded that Qutb was actually ahead of his generation, and rejects statements that Qutb abandoned literature in order to focus on politics after critics rejected his work. He also confirmed that Qutb's writing on social reform predated his participation in the Brotherhood in 1941, which was before he abandoned literature.