Language and power are closely linked. We use language to persuade, that is, to manipulate others into acquiescence. We call a statement true if it has power over us. The authority of language derives from the notion of authorship, the assumption that language is the direct expression of a central, unified voice. The statement which does not have a clear relationship to the voice that speaks it does not have authority. Reported speech is less authoritative than direct speech because its relationship to its source has become adulterated. Writing, as Derrida has shown, is frequently regarded as an extreme form of reported – and therefore adulterated – speech. As a novel about power, The Autumn of the Patriarch is inevitably concerned with the expression of power via language, and particularly via the written word. It is a disconcerting novel, because it depicts a dictator who is not directly responsible for his commands, but becomes their prisoner. García Márquez's creation of a powerless tyrant looks, at first sight, politically naive. The novel can be read, however, not as an attempt to exonerate dictators of their crimes, but as an exploration of the relationship between power and language. This relationship is shown to work in two directions. On the one hand, language is the patriarch's principal instrument of power. On the other, it is his increasing delegation of power to language that brings about his downfall.