Summary
A smell of rotting flesh remains on the fields of sugarcane, which are full of strangled buried bodies and bones. Meanwhile, a fussy tyrant is chatting away in a luxurious space full of wineglasses and fancy clothes. In his palace, everything is as shiny as the face of a watch. The laughter within the palace walls increases and travels through its hallways.
Analysis
Before delving into a deeper close reading, it's a good idea to take a look at the poem's title. It's a plural, telling us that the poem is about not one single dictator but a group of dictators or, more broadly, powerful people. Later in the poem, an individual is referred to as a "satrap," a word that generally describes a subordinate or regional government leader. This collectively is evidence that the "satrap" is just one tyrannical or dictatorial leader within a broader hierarchy of tyrants. By hinting that such a hierarchy exists, Neruda asks readers to consider the systemic, interwoven nature of fascist leadership.
This poem is so chock-full of figurative language that it can, at times, feel like a code. In order to keep track of what's going on, it may be useful to read the poem one metaphor at a time. Let's start with the poem's reference to "petals," a metaphorical way of comparing dead bodies to flowers. This figurative language is deeply ironic. It uses an object generally considered nice-smelling in order to describe a terrible, nauseating scent. The juxtaposition is powerful in and of itself, but it also suggests, more broadly, that the natural beauty of the poem's setting have been compromised by the dictator's leadership: where there should be flowers, there is instead death.
The poem grows stranger and more opaque as we shift into the description of the dictator himself. This is in part a matter of diction, at least in this particular translation. Unusual words like "finical" and "satrap" are likely to give readers pause: in a way, this forbidding vocabulary echoes the forbidding space of the dictator's palace. After all, Neruda makes sure to impress upon us that the palace is a kind of fortress for the tyrannical leaders, keeping the consequences of his own leadership at bay. This isn't just evident from the fact that there are dead bodies outside and polite laughter within. The contrast comes through in other, subtler ways. For instance, while olfactory imagery plays a huge role in Neruda's descriptions of the canefield, it is replaced by visual sound-based imagery during descriptions of the palace. The very senses we use to explore the poem's world shift as we move from the outdoor, public space into the private realm of the dictator.
Increasingly fanciful figurative language helps portray the palace as a fortress-like site of separation from the world, and additionally makes it feel dreamlike and unreal—thereby alerting us that the dictators are living in a barely coherent illusion. The tyrant makes conversation with a series of objects. These objects serve as metonymic representations of his friends, allies, and subordinates. By choosing to call these individuals "wineglasses, collars, and piping," Neruda is able to keep his description of the palace environment brief. He introduces us to the dictator's inner circle and, in the same breath, lets us know that they are living lives of leisure and luxury. Furthermore, by referring to them metaphorically through objects, Neruda hints that even members of this inner circle are not valued as individuals, but rather used as objects. Finally, the speaker refers to the laughter within the dictator's palace as "gloved laughter." This metaphorical description of laughter suggests that the dictators' expression is careful, and that the dictator's experience of the world is mediated by various layers of protection.
The question remains, though: why does Neruda make this poem so code-like? Especially given the urgent importance of the political issue at hand, wouldn't it make sense for the poem's narrative to be a bit more transparent? While Neruda very often uses complicated figurative language, the density of such language here raises another possibility: he may be embracing vague language to make a political point. Under a dictatorial government, in which self-expression and criticism of leadership are limited, writers are often forced to bury their political critiques in allegory and figurative language. Neruda's choice to do something similar here may be a nod to the styles that have developed, out of necessity, under fascism and other forms of authoritarian rule.
