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Copyright © 2013 by R. M. Koster

Copyright © 1975 by Sueños, S. A.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now know or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Koster, R. M., 1934-

The dissertation : Tinieblas book two / R.M. Koster.

    pages cm. — (Tinieblas ; book two)

Summary: “The second book in R.M. Koster’s highly acclaimed Tinieblas trilogy (following The Prince), The Dissertation is the story of—and a story by—Camilo Fuertes. To fulfill his Ph.D. requirement, Fuertes decides to write about his father, the martyred president of Tinieblas, a country in Latin America. We follow Leon as he winds his twisted path through delinquency, learning, bravery, and incest to the presidency. At once a powerful vision of Latin American history and a brilliant parody of the academic form—complete with endnotes!—The Dissertation is an essential postmodern novel in the tradition of Vonnegut, Barth and Nabokov, ready to be embraced by a new generation of readers”— Provided by publisher.

1. Politics and government—Fiction. 2. Latin America—Fiction. 3. Political fiction. I. Title.

PS3561.O84D5 2013 813’.54—dc23 2013029478

Book design and typeformatting by Bernard Schleifer

Manufactured in the United States of America

ISBN: 978-1-4683-0909-6

For H. K. and L. S. K.

PREFACE

This is the second of three books in which I invent the Republic of Tinieblas—its history, geography, politics, and “atmosphere,” as well as a number of its inhabitants. The books are related in theme as well as in setting. Certain actors appear in all three, now as principals, now as supporting players, now as extras. And there are interlacings done for my private amusement. Each book, though, can stand on its own and bear separate viewing, so that while The Dissertation (1975) was done after The Prince (1972) and before Mandragon (1979), I think of it less as tome two of a trilogy than as the central panel of a triptych.

Its structure is, for better or worse, unique. No one else has ever written a novel in the form of a Ph.D. thesis, and no one else is likely to write one now. Pale Fire (in the form of a poem and commentary) provided a measure of precedent I gratefully acknowledge this and other debts to the master. The chief inspiration or irritant (See Note 12) was furnished, however, by an academic colleague. We both were in our mid-thirties. ...