Bless Me, Ultima
Cover of the April 1994 printing
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| Author | Rudolfo Anaya |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Bernadette Vigil and Diane Luger |
| Country | US |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Coming of age |
| Publisher | TQS Publications |
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Publication date
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1972 |
| Media type | hardback/paperback |
| Pages | 262 |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 30095424 |
| Followed by | Heart of Aztlan |
Bless Me, Ultima is a novel by Rudolfo Anaya in which his young protagonist, Antonio Márez y Luna, tells the story of his coming-of-age with the guidance of his curandera, mentor, and protector, Ultima. It has become the most widely read and critically acclaimed novel in the Chicano literary canon since its first publication in 1972. Teachers across disciplines in middle schools, high schools and universities have adopted it as a way to implement multicultural literature in their classes. The novel reflects Chicano culture of the 1940s in rural New Mexico. Anaya’s use of Spanish, mystical depiction of the New Mexican landscape, use of cultural motifs such as La Llorona, and recounting of curandera folkways such as the gathering of medicinal herbs, gives readers a sense of the influence of indigenous cultural ways that are both authentic and distinct from the mainstream.
Bless Me, Ultima is Anaya's best known work and was awarded the prestigious Premio Quinto Sol. In 2008, it was one of 12 classic American novels selected for The Big Read, a community-reading program sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, and in 2009, it was the selected novel of the United States Academic Decathlon.
Bless Me, Ultima is the first in a trilogy followed by the publication of Heart of Aztlan (1976) and Tortuga (1979). With the publication of his novel, Alburquerque (1992), Anaya was proclaimed a front-runner by Newsweek in "what is better called not the new multicultural writing, but the new American writing."
Due to what some consider adult language, violent content and contains sexual references, Bless Me, Ultima was placed on the list of most commonly challenged books in the U.S. in 2013. However, In the last third of the twentieth century, the novel has initiated respect for Chicano literature as an important and nonderivative type of American literature among academics.
Bringing Bless Me, Ultima to fruition took Anaya six years and an additional two years to find a publisher. From 1965 to 1971, Anaya struggled to find his own "voice" as the literary models he knew and had studied at the University of New Mexico (BA English, 1963) did not fit him as a writer. He has also remarked on the unavailability of many authors at that time who could serve as mentors for his life experience as a Chicano. Anaya says that the great breakthrough in finding his voice as a writer occurred in an evening when he was writing late at night. He was struggling to find a way to get the novel to come together and then:
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Wikipedia