In his book Yo El Supremo (1974), an epic narrative about the nineteenth-century dictatorship of José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia in Paraguay (1814–40), Augusto Roa Bastos, probably the most acclaimed writer that country has ever had, wrote a passage on human interaction that is illuminating. He noted that:
Rage, no matter how justified, is something one should never tolerate in oneself. For nursing anger against someone is the same as allowing that person continued control of our thoughts, or our feelings. The least moments. That is lack of self-sovereignty. The height of stupidity in fact. (Roa Bastos 1974)
