Character Analysis: Bless Me Ultima

Enrique’s mother’s decision of leaving couldn’t have been any worse, “She walks away. Donde esta mi mami? Enrique cries, over and over. Where is my mom? His mother never returns, and that decides Enrique’s fate” (Nazario 5). His mother leaving without saying a word to him was heartbreaking because he had no idea she was leaving forever. Enrique became unhappy and had to grow up with this feeling inside him which later caused him to make poor decisions. Being left by his mother, Enrique had to stay with his grandma and “every year on Mother’s day, he [made] a heart shaped card at school and [pressed] it into her hand. “I love you very much grandma”… but she is not his mother” (Nazario 12). The growing love for his grandma caused him to consider her as his mother. Since Enrique was young and didn’t understand why his mother had left him, he blamed her for not being there for him. Nazario hopes to persuade readers to feel like they need to dwell on the topic of immigration and notice that it is still happening

In the novel, we read through Richard Blanco’s childhood in Miami. Growing up in a family of Cubans is a challenge. Through his stories, he searches for identity and belonging. Blanco shares experiences, in which he finds a sense of self. He discusses the importance of being who you are no matter what. Through knowledge and experience, Richard Blanco and I have experienced “Coming of Age”. When you are in the process of this transition, you may go through some conflicts or struggles. These conflicts will most probably teach you life lessons. You will gain wisdom throughout these years, which will make you more mature.

The leisurely read of Bless Me, Ultima isn’t always high on hand to hand actions; however, it is abundant with internal conflicts on the main character, Antonio. Through the high points and low points of his life, Antonio struggles to find an answer for his life. Antonio’s internal conflict about his fate, leads to him questioning his religion and who the people around him actually are, as people. But when Ultima joins them at the house, Antonio has a person who he can relate with to talk out his misfortunes. Antonio’s quest for his fate and religion is a painstaking journey that extends until the last few pages of the novel.

2a) There are many themes present in this which are isolation, immigration and identity. The series of parallel events that happen throughout the story help reinforce these themes as the boy is trying to fit in and find acceptance within the school that he is attending. Being an immigrant from Italy and not knowing

In the novel, Bless me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya, a boy goes through many more experiences than any child in the hot summer days in Santa Rosa, New Mexico. He witnesses the deaths of his close friends and family. This boy expresses his emotions and grief through his dreams, only to wake up with fear and confusion in his mind. Antonio’s life is filled with dreams that foreshadow future incidents, as well as influences Antonio’s beliefs of religion and ideas of innocence.

Antonio was brought up speaking Spanish and his families cultural views. When Antonio begins school, he begins to experience English and how important it is in the academic world throughout the United States. Antonio is forced to learn English to speak with the other children who are not familiar with the cultural background and do not speak Spanish. Florence is his only friend that is accepting of Antonio’s culture. Florence seems to be Antonio’s escape from adulthood, whenever they are together they both always seem to be happy, innocent kids in that very moment. Antonio soon realizes that although his mother is very supportive many of his classmates are less accepting of his

Many symbols are in the presence of an innocent child such as a golden carp god or being watched over by the owl of a “witch”. Rudolfo Anaya’s Bless Me, Ultima is a story of how a boy who wants to discover who he truly is; Antonio struggles with the conflicting blood of his parents’ opposing natures running through his veins. The symbols that Antonio comes across cause him to question his faith and try to discover his destiny, such as the god causes him to question if he was praying to the wrong god. Mental conflicts such as this are what make this book important in Chicano literature as it is expressive of the problems that Chicano’s face because of their mixed culture, leaving them to feel lost and alone.

smallest bit of good can stand against all the powers of evil in the world and it will emerge

Bless Me, Ultima is a novel created by author Rudolfo Anaya that tells a story about a young boy named Antonio who grows up to learn deep cultural values and develops a special bond with a character that possesses mysterious magical powers. The story takes place in New Mexico during World War II in a setting of grassy plain and green valley. It was a summer when Antonio in his early years of seven first met Ultima who came to stay with him and his family. Antonio was just like any other ambitious boy who was full of questions and had an insatiable hunger for knowledge, but Ultima on the other hand was an older woman who possessed a puzzling spiritual history that would teach and change Antonio

Alejandrez begins his essay with a story from his childhood. He sets up the story by giving it a time and place he is the son of a migrant worker born in a cotton field in Merigold, Mississippi. He then describes his difficult childhood using vivid language, as the son of a migrant worker he had to move many times a year and assimilate into many different schools. His family had to make ends meet with the little money they had so most of the time that meant having no shoes or one pair of pants. The social climate was also very tense, he describes it as “ I always remembered my experience in Texas, where

A “Bildungsroman” is defined as a piece of literature that focuses on the mental, moral, and psychological growth of a protagonist in transition from childhood to adulthood. Ideologies adopted into a Bildungsroman are ones that shows the coming of age like the shortcoming of loved ones, meet with challenges that the adult world presents to the younger generation, and having mentors or guides who teach the ways of life through valuable lessons. In Rudolfo Anaya’s coming of age novel, “Bless Me, Ultima”, the Bildungsroman concepts and ideas about maturity from childhood blossom as the novel's protagonist, Antonio Marez, lives his Hispanic, Catholic life at the age of eight, through countless experiences that molds his coming of age. Elements that substantially influences Antonio's coming of age includes confrontations with death, disappointment in realizing soul crushing realities, and encounters with emotions and despair that would be met in the adult world. Antonio, through, these structural elements, shapes his shift from a child to a man by emphasizing why certain events occur in his life.

As children grow up in a dysfunctional family, they experience trauma and pain from their parent’s actions, words, and attitudes. With this trauma experienced, they grew up changed; different from other children. The parent’s behavior affects them and whether they like it or not, sometimes it can influence them, and they can react against it or can repeat it. In Junot Díaz’s “Fiesta, 1980”, is presented this theme of the dysfunctional family. The author presents a story of an adolescent Latin boy called Junior, who narrates the chronicles of his dysfunctional family, a family of immigrants from the Dominican Republic driving to a party in the Bronx, New York City. “Papi had been with

One thing all human beings have in common is the struggle for self identity. Children are raised by parents or guardians who have struggled and fought for their own identities. In many cases, parents are still trying to figure it out, while raising their own children. Such is the case with the characters in Junot Diaz’s, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The theme of identity is conveyed through the characters’ Dominican culture, social standing, and in finding love. Oscar, Lola, and Yunior are three central characters in Oscar Wao, who’s Dominican cultural and familial expectations were major obstacles as they struggled to establish their identity.

While this story is a comparison paper, it also serves as a narrative of events Andrea Roman experienced growing up Bolivian while living in America. She captured the audience by being knowledgeable. She compared her life being raised in America with strict Bolivian parents who had a culture shock and did not understand the American ways of living. She tells the reader about disagreements she and her mother have on their ways of life.

The kid is a foreigner in his school because of his ethnicity, an American Filipino. He regularly it's bullied at school because of his ethnicity, the kid is often teased by his archenemies, Brandon DeStefano and Tenzil Jones because of his ethnicity. After reading the paper that the kid had written, the kid mentions that archenemies, “added an accent that isn’t mine. Then he looked up at me, shaking his head in disapproval,” (Tenorio, 105). As result, the kid finds himself always oppressed by those around him, this forced the kid to take a new perspective on the outside world, and turn him into an outcast. For this reasons, the kid makes it much tough to trust that he can overcome his oppression of being