Themes In Bless Me Ultima

Jacqueline Machado

AP Literature

LAP- Bless Me Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya

Period 3

September 27, 2016

JM pg 1

Topic 4

3 deaths that Antonio has experienced and how they fostered his religious ambivalence

Lupito

Narciso

Florence

Life is about unexpected moments, obstacles, and experiences. We usually tend to take things for granted or we’re never actually grateful for what we cherish the most. Life is valued greatly depending on your point of view. Life is a treasure most of us hold dear to us. Then there’s death.

After witnessing Lupito’s death, Lupito still remains within Antonio’s mind wandering like a lost soul not knowing the ending to his death. He still continues to question whether god has helped his spirit or if he is forever lost to wander. “It is the soul of Lupito, they cried in fear, doomed to wander the river at night because the waters washed his soul away!”(Pg. 26) This is the first placement of Antonio’s religious ambivalence. Antonio may think to himself that seeing someone die is a sin, the idea of growing up thinking that the world is perfectly put together and being restricted from reality is a sin, restriction is a sin. For young boy of his age no growing up with any real worries is ideal and to have the exposure of death is traumatic. This death has opened up his eyes into reality and showed him the true side of life. Antonio has seen the good and evil of the world like Ultima. She is portrayed as the savior of the town, because there is no evil that can match up to the goodness in her. “For us Ultima personified goodness, and any risk in defense of goodness was right. She was the only person I had ever seen defeat evil where all else had failed.” Antonio starts to see the magic of Ultima, and starts to question whether Ultima’s magic is stronger that the power of the priest and of God. He seeks a feminine figure to answer his questions on

195) Florence would always question God, as Antonio did. Florence wondered how could there be a God who knows “everything”. Florence dies drowning in the river. Florence’s death really pushed Antonio to his core and actually shook him out of his innocence. When Florence dies Antonio becomes eager and wants to go to his uncle’s place so that he can mature a little bit. The last bit of innocence that Antonio has had finally vanished when he visualizes the death of Florence. His questioning continues as to why God had taken the life of a young boy, and where would Florence go since he didn’t believe in God. The death of Florence gave Antonio the possibility that God may not exist and there was