Latin-American Hero

Rico, BANDIT AND DICTATOR--Antonio de Fierro Blanco--Honghton Mifflin ($2).

Fashions in heroes change like fashions in hats, and the ruthless strong man is fast returning to popular favor. Author Blanco, romantic but unsentimental Latin, has always admired the type. His idealized portrait of an imaginary dictator will not please U. S. readers so much as his Journey of the Flame (TIME, Nov. 6), but they will lend a friendlier ear than they would have a few years ago to Rico, Bandit and Dictator.

Son of an exiled Austrian archduke and an Indian woman, Rico grew up in the jungles of a nameless Spanish-American country, turned bandit in his youth and became dictator in his manhood. A frank realist, he never hesitated to kill when it was necessary. He was pleased that the people said of him: "He is a man of business." His principle: "If in doubt, kill! Nor fear that you waste aught of value." His aim was to govern well; when he found that modernization went against the country's grain he benevolently preserved the status quo. He permitted the kind of free press that Mussolini enjoys. When a newspaper offended him he confiscated its owners' property, paid for it in worthless bonds. His laws were few but so sternly administered that crime became practically unknown. Said he: "It is my belief that England's freedom from crime today is largely due to that wise period when you hanged a man for stealing a loaf of bread." He made all farms taxfree, prohibited all forms of advertising. If anyone was found wearing gold braid he was made Vice Admiral of the non-existent navy, given no salary but forced to wear a uniform so excessively expensive that its cost ruined him.

Though numerous attempts were made on his life Rico survived them all. His narrowest escape was when for a while he turned vegetarian, became cowlike and contented. Lured in time's nick from this pitiable state by a fat, juicy steak, he "saw the world again as it is, not as it should be," called out the firing squad to execute a fresh batch of enemies. At the height of his power Dictator Rico mysteriously disappeared, leaving his country once more a prey to real life.

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