Reality vs. dream
Asturias blurs the separation between dream and reality throughout El Señor Presidente, making it one of the novel's most prominent themes. Latin American writer and critic Ariel Dorfman notes that the mixing of dream and reality is partly a result of Asturias's frequent use of figurative language. This stylistic choice is reflected in the content of the story itself, which suggests that an important effect of dictatorial power is the blurring of dreams and reality.[56] Dorfman also notes that the President is sustained by fear, which further blurs the distinction between reality and dream. This fear grants him the voluntary or involuntary support of others, enabling the President to exercise his mandates.[57] Dorfman asserts that the President's use of fear elevates his mandates to legends. These legends are then able to "impose itself upon reality because men live it fully in a way to make sense of their humanity".[57] One example of this theme, elucidated by Eckart, is a series of scenes leading to the arrest of the lawyer Carvajal. When the President decides to blame Carvajal for the murder of Colonel Sonriente, it is clear that Carvajal is confounded by the charges.[58] Moreover, despite being a lawyer, Carvajal is unable to defend himself during the sham trial with "the members of the tribunal so drunk that they cannot hear him".[58] As Eckart asserts, "to be captured and tortured without ever knowing why is another horrible feature of a dictatorship. For the victim, reality unexpectedly becomes unreality, no longer comprehensible by a logical mind."[58] Therefore, the use of fear by a dictatorship blurs the line between reality and dream for the people being ruled.
Asturias's ambiguous use of detail adds to the confusion between reality and dream. For example, the title pages of parts one and two state that they take place between April 21 and 27. Part three, on the other hand, occurs over "Weeks, Months, Years". While this time-scale initially appears very specific, no year is indicated. Furthermore, the novel is set in a country similar to Guatemala and includes references to Maya gods (such as in the chapter "Tohil's Dance") but no direct statement by any character confirms this. Bauman argues that Asturias, by "preferring instead to distance himself from the immediate historical reality and focus critical light on the internal problems", attends to what "he sees there".[59] This enables Asturias to address a wider audience, not restricted to Guatemalans, that can relate individually to the experience of living under dictatorial rule.
In obscuring reality, truth becomes unclear. As literary critic Mireille Rosello notes, it is the President who decides what is true, denying any other opinion, even if other characters witness an event with their own eyes or ears.[60] Unlike the characters in the novel, readers are aware that the characters are relying on a notion of truth or reality that no longer exists under the dictatorship of the President.[61] "Truth" does not exist before the President puts it into words,[62] and even at that, the only "truth" under dictatorial rule is the words the President is speaking at any given moment—one cannot even safely repeat the President's versions of events.[63] The characters are thus left unaware of what constitutes the "truth".[62]
Writing and power
A major theme of the dictator novel concerns the use of writing as a medium of power. In El Señor Presidente, Asturias uses language to challenge dictatorial power. Throughout the novel the reader observes the authority of the President over the people through his control of what they write. In the chapter "The President's Mail-Bag", a stream of letters informs the President of peoples' actions. While many are "writing the truth" and turning in their fellow citizens, many others feel that "it is not safe to trust to paper".[64] Writing is closely linked to authority and is a means to solidify power, because language can be manipulated into lies that eventually kill. For example, the President orders a newspaper to include the false statement that he attended the wedding of Camila, the daughter of General Canales. When the General reads these words and perceives them as truth, his heart is broken and he subsequently dies.[65] Miguel Angel Face is also killed by the manipulation of words: he is told that Camila has become the President's mistress, and upon hearing this falsified news, he loses the will to live.[66] These episodes in the novel demonstrate how closely language, the written word, and power are linked. The characters in El Señor Presidente lose their sense of reality, making it difficult for them to know whom to trust. As Rosello argues, "in this state of terror, language is deliberately used as a means of seducing the addressee into harmlessness, and has lost its function of conveying information".[62]
Hope
In El Señor Presidente, hope is suppressed by the dictatorship. As the Judge Advocate states in the novel, "the President's first rule of conduct is never to give grounds for hope, and everyone must be kicked and beaten until they realise the fact".[67] It can be argued that Camila represents hope in the novel because both her father and husband were able to persevere under the dictatorship by thinking of her; however, the President destroys this sense of hope with false stories. When the thought of her loyalty is eliminated, both her father and husband die because they have lost the hope of returning to her. Furthermore, Camila's happiness with her child and their escape to the countryside can be seen as the one glimpse of hope in an otherwise dark and disturbing ending. For critic Jean Franco, it is love that offers what little hope there is in the novel: "The system is undermined only by love—the love of an idiot for his mother, a woman trying desperately to save her husband from death."[68]
Tyranny and alienation
The theme of tyranny and alienation shows how a dictatorship not only alienates and "others" the people in the country, but also prevents the country itself from achieving European modernization. In a 1967 essay, literary critic Ariel Dorfman argues that "dictatorship, which in El Señor Presidente manifested itself in the political realm, is now a dictatorship of fire of the word, but always a tyranny that men themselves ask for, adore, and help to build".[57] Dorfman also notes that "The 'little human bundles' of Asturias's world end up destroying themselves, being disintegrated by the very forces that they themselves spoke."[57] By this he means that the characters are undone by their own actions and words as the President uses and twists them. The tyranny of language perversely parallels the political oppression which is omnipresent in Asturias's world.[57] Richard Franklin argues that "in a philosophical sense, Asturias has eloquently affirmed the validity of individual experience".[31]
Asturias shows how, under the conditions of dictatorship, characters slowly lose their human identities.[69] The Zany, for instance, while fleeing the city, is described as running "aimlessly, with his mouth opened and his tongue hanging out, slobbering and panting".[15] Just a few lines later, the Zany is "whin[ing] like an injured dog".[70] In what is in part a critique of the book, Jorge Barrueto argues that El Señor Presidente depicts Latin America as a whole as "Other".[69] Everyone from the President to the Zany displays this "otherness" as they cannot be civilized.[69] Dictatorship produces Otherness, by dehumanizing its subjects, but is also itself presented as barbaric, absurd, and no more than an "imitation of the European ways".[71] Thanks to phenomena such as dictatorship, Latin America appears to be a land where "Otherness" prevails and for this reason Latin America cannot "evolve" or reach truly European levels of modernity.[69] For Barrueto, "this narrative's goal is to prove that Latin American societies, though they are aware of the blueprint of Modernity, are unable to act accordingly."[72]
Fertility and destruction
According to Latin American literature scholar Richard Callan, the dichotomy between destruction and fertility is embodied in the opposition between the President and Miguel Angel Face. While the President represents sterility and destruction,[73] his favorite, Miguel Angel Face, embodies fertility, a positive and generative force of nature.[73] Callan notes that Miguel Angel Face's transformation from the President's favorite to a positive generative force is not deliberate. Instead, Callan argues that "it results from the birth of true love in his formerly barren heart. However, he is too engrossed in his love to notice the shift in his relationship with the President."[73] The President, not surprisingly, identifies himself candidly with death.[73] Examples from the novel include the death sentences he gives to Abel Carvajal (for a crime the President is fully aware the man did not commit) and to Lucio Vasquez, a man in his service that carried out his wish for the Zany to be killed and yet is still executed. In contrast to the President, Callan highlights Miguel Angel Face's association with love. The love that Miguel Angel Face develops for Camila identifies him with love and life, and leads to procreation—the birth of his son.[73] Rosello argues that even before his transformation, Miguel Angel Face was aware of the President's destructive nature. As such, Rosello argues that Miguel Angel Face "knew from the beginning that the only 'safety' in the President's world is a form of self destruction: only by losing his identity and letting the President's mind invade his own could he hope to remain alive".[74] So, when he failed to comply, he did indeed lose his life.
