Winesburg, Ohio 157offered a renewed sense of pride in la raza (the race)
and its most intrinsic unit, la familia.
Elizabeth McNeil
spirituality in Bless Me, Ultima
The most intense theme in Bless Me, Ultima is the
definition of one’s own spirituality. Although the
protagonist, Antonio, is only six years old—which
is extremely young for a coming-of-age novel—
Rodolfo Anaya convincingly represents the tender,
gifted psyche of the young protagonist and his
spiritual awakening. The story is also convincing
because Antonio does not undergo his transforma-
tion to independent spiritual selfhood alone. He is
guided by the powerful curandera Ultima, who had
helped bring Antonio into the world. Immediately
following Antonio’s birth, the two factions of his
family—the pious Catholic peasant farmers on his
mother’s side, and on his father’s side the lusty,
freedom-loving vaqueros—had begun warring over
Antonio’s destiny. Ultima had stopped the fighting,
firmly asserting that only she knew his destiny, a
proclamation that plays out over the course of the
novel.
Representing the dual strands of Chicano iden-
tity, Antonio and his family live between two worlds
in a number of ways, including the spiritual orienta-
tions of the parents’ disparate upbringings. The fam-
ily’s home is situated near the river, set off on its own
between the town and the llano. The children speak
only Spanish before they begin their schooling, and
in school will be forced to speak only English. Anto-
nio’s mother hopes he will become a priest, and his
father dreams this youngest son will travel west with
him—as his older sons have refused to do—to make
it big in the vineyards of California.
As the novel opens, it is immediately clear that,
although Antonio’s free, pure spirit is at imminent
risk, his innocence and openness to the world are
still intact. He is just beginning to attend school,
where the language and culture of his upbringing
will be replaced by English and by Anglo knowl-
edge, and he has not yet been subsumed by the
Catholic Church’s intense behavioral restrictions
and attendant shame and guilt.
When Ultima, who is reaching the end of her
life, comes to live with the family, her renewed con-
nection to Antonio is something the still spiritually
receptive young boy has been expecting. Ultima
becomes Antonio’s guide as he learns the magic
and peace of nature, a commonsensical knowledge
base that also allows him to begin to understand
the life-and-death struggles of the adults around
him who are affected by war sickness (a spiritually
nullifying stress that drives one man from the town
to commit a random murder, thereby setting himself
up to be killed as a result); the clash of indigenous
and colonial ways of being, and conflicting Hispanic
and Anglo cultural expectations; and, as represented
especially by Antonio’s father, the people’s lack of
access to the (Anglo) American dream of unlimited
prosperity.
Antonio is not pulled to either his mother’s or
his father’s hopes for his future, nor does he feel the
need to strike out on his own and abandon the family,
as have his older brothers, who grew up too quickly
through their involvement in the many ugly facets of
World War II. With the gentle guidance of Ultima,
six-year-old Antonio finds his identity and purpose
in the powerful “presence” of the river and the mystic
golden carp. Nature, Ultima, and Antonio’s strong
sense of place all guide him to his destiny, which is
to love life in spite of the tragic obstacles that are put
in his path—to remain spiritually strong, in other
words, no matter the circumstances. Antonio’s dis-
covery of a spiritual identity that is rooted in nature
and indigenous mysticism suggests an alternative
to both the submissive Catholicism that rules the
humble farmers’ lives and the spiritual void of the
lustful vaqueros who revel in their descent from the
brutal conquistadores. Through his protagonist’s
spirituality, which is independent of Catholic dogma
or the hypocrisy of some of its practitioners, Anaya
emphasizes that metaphysical strength comes from
an autonomous spirit that is connected to the land.
Elizabeth McNeilANDERSON, SHERWOOD
Winesburg, Ohio (1919)
Winesburg, Ohio, is a cycle comprising 21 short
stories plus one prefatory story, “The Book of the
Grotesque.” That initial story introduces the con-
cept that runs through the rest of the stories: People