Rudolfo Anaya’s Bless Me Ultima Magical Realism Rudolfo Anaya’s Bless Me Ultima

Magical Realism Literary genre & movement Franz Roh (1925) German art critic Arturo Uslar-Pietri Applied to literature Latin American writers

Magical Realism “The ordinary as miraculous and the miraculous as ordinary.” Magical elements appear in an otherwise realistic setting Combination of physical reality & psychological reality

Different from Fantasy Remains grounded in the real world Unlike Narnia or Middle Earth Stretches the definition of realism & reality Not so much a belief, but a “lack of disbelief” Power lies not in answers, but in questions

Common Literary Conventions Juxtaposes opposite elements: Dreaming/waking Life/death Civilized/wild Hyperbole Exaggeration until it becomes “magical” Childlike look at the familiar “charm of the object” Reimagining the mundane Engages reader into text Mirror Forces questioning

Latin America Landscape Native influence Vast, mysterious terrain Snow capped mountains to volcanoes & Amazon waterfalls Native influence Blend of old, mystical culture with colonization & Christianity

Famous Magical Realism Authors Gabriel G. Marquez One Hundred Years of Solitude Love in the Time of Cholera Laura Esquivel Like Water for Chocolate Isabel Allende House of the Spirits

Rudolfo Anaya October 30, 1937 - Born in Pastura, Mexico Rural village Moved to Albuquerque, NM High School & College Currently a college professor at University of New Mexico Father of Chicano literature

Bless Me Ultima Bildungsroman German for “novel of self-cultivation” Coming-of-age Many similarities between Anaya & Antonio Marez Six yrs. old @ start of novel Father: vaquero culture; richly connected to land Mother: Catholic, modern, city dweller Struggle between two worlds: Rich, mystical, pagan family ties & traditional Roman Catholicism Ultima Curandera Healer: akin to shaman