Essay Questions

Illustrate how the novel-write Miguel Angel explores the concept of loyalty and allegiance in The President.

In The President, Miguel Angel explicitly brings out the idea of allegiance and loyalty in relatable terms. In the novel, Angel Face (also named Miguel and the protagonist of this story) is depicted as the apple of the president’s eye. Angel Face carries out the president's most crucial business plans and even works as his advisor. The President trusts Angel face enough to allow him to take on even his important decisions. However, when later Angel Face meets Camila and falls for her, he develops a new perspective on the president’s rule, He begins to question his loyalty to the President. After Angel Face gets married to Camila, the President is infuriated. As such, arrests Angel Face, he is put in prison where he dies, sure that Camila is the President’s mistress even though she is not. Miguel, therefore, epitomizes loyalty and allegiance as the novel-write uses him as the centerpiece in revealing the authoritarian power of the President.

The President is Miguel Angel’s exploration and show of displeasure with dictatorship and authoritarian type of govern ship. Support this statement with illustrations from the novel.

In The President, Miguel Angel clearly brings out the adverse effects of authoritarianism and dictatorship in a manner that points out his stand with regards to the same. From the beginning of the novel to its climax, the novel-write uses the theme of dictatorship to guide the plot. At the beginning of th novel, Canales and Cajaval are accused of having committed a murder at the President's dictate. He even ensures that the beggars who witnessed the crime are tortured. Additionally, when Miguel convinces Canales to flee, its also at the quirk of the President. During Canales’ flight, he witnesses the kind of life that the people are living. The suffering of the people is implicit from the fear in which they live and their impoverished state due to government oppression. Based on this point of view, it can be argued that Miguel Angel indeed uses the novel as his way of expressing disinterest and disgust for the dictatorship and authoritarian form of government.