Passion or Profession: Writer

Period: 1917–2005

Bastos is probably Paraguay’s best-known writer, but he began as a soldier. He fought in the Chaco War against Bolivia. Not long after the war, political forces in the country compelled him to flee to Argentina and then France, where he worked as a professor. In exile, he wrote his masterpieces, including I, the Supreme, which deals with the life of dictator José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia.