Bless Me, Ultima

Bless Me, Ultima

By Rudolfo Anaya

Bless Me, Ultima, by Rudolfo Anaya is a story of a chicano family and the struggles that they face in trying to raise there family in the "old" and "new" ways. The story is based around a young man named Tony and his coming of age. The primary struggle in this story is between the beliefs of Tony's mother, Maria and Tony's father, Gabriel. Both of Tony's parents want different thing for there children and the future of there family

Maria is a very traditional woman from a traditional Mexican family and has high hopes for her sons, especially Tony. She believes that Tony should become a priest and to her that would be the greatest thing that could happen to her and her family. Gabriel has different plans though. He is a hard working honorable man who comes from a family of ranchers. Gabriel's dreams are to one day move to California and work a ranch with his four sons and live the life that his father did. Tony has three older brothers who come back from war changed. War has matured these three and also opened their eyes to the world outside of the little community they grew up in. All three have very different ideas of what is in there future, than there father.

The most interesting and mysterious character in the story is Ultima. Ultima is an old woman that comes to live with the family. She is a very traditional woman and is educated in the ways of the past. She is a Curendera, or medicine women of sorts. She is much respected among the people of the community especially Maria. At first Gabriel does not like the idea of her moving in but eventually comes around to the idea.

Immediately there become a strong bond between Tony and Ultima. Through Ultima Tony learns about life and the ways of the past. One of the most important things that he learns is about the struggle between good and evil, which is a recurring theme through out the story. Ultima teaches Tony a lot but does so in a way in which he learns these valuable lessons by himself.

From the beginning of the story it is very apparent that Tony is a special individual that is very intelligent and grown up for his age. Even though Ultima and Tony are very close it becomes more and more apparent that there is a much stronger and mysterious connection between the two of them, almost as if her moving in with