Bless Me Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya essays

Bless Me Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya essays In the book, Bless Me Ultima (New York Warner Books, 1994), Rudolfo A. Anaya tells the story of Antonio Marez. The story takes place in Spanish America on the border between fertile farming lands and the open plains. Antonio is six years old when Ultima, an elderly healer comes to live with his family. At the time of her arrival, Antonio is making a transition from a boy to a young adult. His parents, Gabriel and Marà ­a, disagree about the proper life and education for Antonio. Marà ­a is a devout Catholic and wants Antonio to follow her traditions and become a priest. Gabriel wants Antonio to follow his traditions of restless wandering across the plains and live the life of a cowboy. Before Ultima arrives, Antonio dreams of her role in his birth. The two sides of his family argue over the right to dispose of the afterbirth according to their family traditions. Ultima declares that she shall bury it herself. Therefore she alone will know Antonio's future. Antonio's parents are pressuring him to choose between their radically different family traditions. Antonio's dream about his birth reveals the nervousness this pressure causes him. Antonio also makes a great effort to make sense of the competing moral structures of each religion he encounters through his Pagan friends, Samuel and Cico and his Catholic mother. His atheist friend, Florence, increases Antonio's confusion in his quest to understand his world. He attempts to understand the nature of good and evil through different cultures only to find that there is no easy answer. In addition to larger conflicts, Antonio faces the clash between Anglo and Hispanic cultures when he begins attending school along with other problems. Antonio faces pressure to exclude Florence because he is an atheist and undergoes teasing because some people view Ultima as a Bruja or a witch. Antonio witnesses three separate deaths in the novel including his good friend Florence. Each death forces Anton...