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Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina was the historical dictator of the Dominican Republic from 1930–1961. In the novel, he is both a frightening, dangerous man and almost pathetically insecure and childish. He forces the people to hang pictures of him in their houses and use his name as part of a greeting, something so self-aggrandizing it suggests insecurity. Patria emphasizes his childishness in her prayers to him, comparing him to Nelson misbehaving as a child. Instead of undercutting his terrifying demeanor, this infantile attitude serves to make him all the more dangerous because of how easy he is to anger and how much power he wields. For example, Minerva is able to save Sinita after her assassination attempt by shouting “¡Viva Trujillo!” and removing her cloak to show more skin. At the Discovery Day dance, Trujillo is furious at the very mention of Communist rebel Virgilio Morales, only to calm down when Minerva pays Trujillo a compliment by talking about the historical importance of the university. By feigning worry about Trujillo’s feelings and making a flirtatious game with the dice, Minerva is able to smooth over slapping him, at least for the time being. In each of these incidents, Trujillo’s fragile ego, rather than any sort of dignity or strategy, drives his moods.
By portraying Trujillo as insecure, the novel points out the fundamental flaws in a patriarchal dictatorship fueled by machismo. There is a patriarchal nature to Trujillo’s leadership style. First, he styles himself as the father of the nation, even making his birthday a holiday. In renaming the streets of the capital after his family members, he remakes the country as the seat of his family, with himself at the helm. In addition, he acts entitled to any woman he finds attractive, from a high school girl like Lina Lovatón, to a senator’s wife, to Minerva at a dance within sight of her family. His leadership also evokes patriarchy in the way he uses religion, with his portrait often hung alongside that of Jesus. Patria at one point even addresses this portrait with the same fearful bargaining prayers that she does God the Father. Thus, Trujillo uses patriarchy to justify his rule, but everyone can see the terrible damage it does to the citizens, families, and particularly the women of the Dominican Republic.
