 To be considered a dictator novel , a story should have strong political themes drawn from history , a critical examination of the power held by the dictator , the caudillo , and some general reflection on the nature of authoritarianism . Although some dictator novels centre on one historical dictator ( albeit in fictional guise ) , they do not analyze the economics , politics , and rule of the régime as might a history book . The dictator novel genre includes I , the Supreme ( 1974 ) , by Augusto Roa Bastos , about Dr. Francia of Paraguay , and The Feast of the Goat ( 2000 ) , by Mario Vargas Llosa , about Rafael Leónidas Trujillo of the Dominican Republic . Alternatively , the novelist might create a fictional dictator to achieve the same narrative end , as in Reasons of State ( 1974 ) , by Alejo Carpentier , in which the dictator is a composite man assembled from historical dictators . The genre of the dictator novel has been very influential in the development of a Latin American literary tradition , because many of the novelists rejected traditional , linear story @-@ telling techniques , and developed narrative styles that blurred the distinctions between reader , narrator , plot , characters , and story . In examining the authority of leadership , the novelists also assessed their own social roles as paternalistic dispensers of wisdom , like that of the caudillo whose régime they challenged in their dictator novels . 
