Bless Me Ultima Essay. The Story Of Unusual Woman

You are going to read one of the essays on Bless me Ultima. This novel was written by Rudolfo Anaya and became very popular among readers. There were written a lot of stories about this book. We just want to represent our essay about this novel. Our custom writing service can help you to do your homework and will respond to all your questions. You can get acquainted with what we are engaged in. Here is the necessary information.

The Author

At first I want to tell you the general and the most important information about the author.

Rudolfo Anaya was a talented American writer. He is well-known for his best novel “Bless me, Ultima”. It was his first and very successful work.  This story is about Rudolfo Anaya himself or more exactly – about his childhood. After his graduating from university he worked as an English teacher. Later Anaya got married, and his wife Patricia always supported her husband in his writings. They say that Anaya was one of the first writers, who founded the Chicano literature. It is the unique type of literature, which were born and widespread among Mexican Americans who lived in the United States. Those people wanted to save their own literature and culture even in the other country.  As a rule, Chicano literature was written in Spanish and English languages.

With the publication of the novel "Bless Me, Ultima", Anaya suddenly became very popular. Almost at once he received the status of the classic of young Mexican-American literature. He called the godfather of the Chicano literature because he created a lot of natural Mexican-American characters.

About The Novel

Rudolfo Anaya started to write his best novel “Bless me, Ultima” in 1963. During a long period of time he had difficulties with publishing of this novel. Nobody wanted to publish the story because of its strange combine of two languages – Spanish and English. Anaya was trying to find himself in that time literature. It was really difficult. He wanted to publish the novel about his childhood – but he could not.  But soon “Bless me, Ultima” was awarded the national literary award –  Premio Quinto Sol. It is considered to be the best novel written by a Chicano. After this award the publishing house Quinto Sol quickly published this autobiographical novel. The novel had about 21 printings and 300 thousand copies. It was translated in many languages.

The Plot

The novel “Bless me, Ultima” represents the culture and a lot of features of Chicano. Antonio personifies the people of Chicano, its youth turned into the future.

“Bless me, Ultima” is about the relations between the seven-year-old boy Antonio and a woman called Ultima (she was a healer). The book events are developed in New Mexico in the early forties. While the whole world is shipped in war, little Antonio faces the ambiguous events which are taking place around him. His life changes forever after unexpected arrival of Ultima, the woman with supernatural abilities who bears a good mission. The woman inspires Antonio to be interested in the world surrounding him. He starts to analyze all the events from absolutely other point of view. Little Antonio becomes the witness of an different events and it has a deep impact on his concept of divinity and on all his future.

Antonio – is Rudolfo Anaya himself. The boy was a part of serious conflict between different cultures. Antonio knew what it means when farmers and cowboys could not came to the general opinion or when Spanish-speaking people offended English-speaking ones. Anaya’s father was a cowboy and his mom belongs to a farmer family. That’s why the author exactly knew what he was writing about.  And in Anaya’s family folk medicine was also very popular. In the novel Ultima represented us such kind of treatment. So, we can be absolutely sure, that the story has autobiographical features.

The Main Characters

The novel is rather big and has a lot of characters.  They are Antonio’s best friends, his brothers and sisters, His grandfather, the war veteran,  the priest etc. It takes a lot of time to speak about each of them. Here is the list of  main characters, which played an important role during the whole story.

Antonio Márez – is seven years old boy and the main character of the novel. He is very serious child and likes to think about different things. He is not sure if he is a Christian or a pagan, because he knows a lot about both of these ideologies. When Ultima comes into his life, he begins his way of growing. He independently makes all the choices and is ready to be responsible for his actions.

Gabriel and María Márez – are Antonio’s mother and father. Both parents wants a good future for Antonio. But the problem is that this future is quite different. Mom is a Catholic and her father is a successful farmer; she wants her son to be a priest. But Gabriel is against it, he dreams his son to be a restless cowboy, as he is himself.

Ultima – is a real healer. Some people think that she is a witch, but it is unknown exactly. Her power had been inherited from her ancestors. Ultima is a little bit mysterious woman, but she is very clever, wise and kind. Some citizens are afraid of her, and even Antonio cannot sometimes understand her words of acts. Ultima teaches the little boy a lot, especially that he can be tolerant to everybody an try to respect each person, despite the belief system. She loves Antonio and tries to help him to become independent and to make his life easier.

No doubt, “Bless me, Ultima” is worth of reading. The novel will tell you about life and culture of Chicano people. I think you had not heard about Chicano before. To read the novel is a good chance to broaden your horizons. I am sure that you will like this true story and the time spent with this book will be useful for you.