The dictator novel : writers and politics in the global South

Where there are dictators, there are novels about dictators. But “dictator novels” do not simply respond to the reality of dictatorship. As this genre has developed and cohered, it has acquired a self-generating force distinct from its historical referents. The dictator novel has become a space in which writers consider the difficulties of national consolidation, explore the role of external and global forces in sustaining dictatorship, and even interrogate the political functions of writing itself. Literary representations of the dictator, therefore, provide ground for a self-conscious and self-critical theorization of the relationship between writing and politics itself. The Dictator Novel positions novels about dictators as a vital genre in the literatures of the Global South. Primarily identified with Latin America, the dictator novel also has underacknowledged importance in the postcolonial literatures of francophone and anglophone Africa. Although scholars have noted similarities, this book is the first extensive comparative analysis of these traditions; it includes discussions of authors including Gabriel García Márquez, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Alejo Carpentier, Augusto Roa Bastos, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, José Mármol, Esteban Echeverría, Ousmane Sembène , Chinua Achebe, Aminata Sow Fall, Henri Lopès, Sony Labou Tansi, and Ahmadou Kourouma. This juxtaposition illuminates the internal dynamics of the dictator novel as a literary genre. In so doing, Armillas-Tiseyra puts forward a comparative model relevant to scholars working across the Global South. Contents Introduction: The Papier-Mâché Parrot Chapter 1. Writing Aporia: Aesthetics and Politics in the Dictator Novel of the Global South Chapter 2. Tabula Rasa: Juan Manuel de Rosas and the Emergence of the Dictator as a Literary Figure Chapter 3. Fathers of the Fatherlands: Writing, Politics, and Literary Form at the End of the Latin American "Boom" Chapter 4. Mésaventures: The Politics and Poetics of the Dictator Novel in the African Postcolony Chapter 5. The Dictator in the Corpolony: On the Dictator Novel in the Time of Transition Afterword: Moving Outward and Forward Acknowledgments Notes Index Positions novels about dictators as a vital genre in the literatures of the Global South. Primarily identified with Latin America, the dictator novel also has under acknowledged importance in the postcolonial literatures of francophone and anglophone Africa. This book is the first extensive comparative analysis of these traditions.