Library research: Bless Me, Ultima
Rudolfo Anaya grew up in La Pasturas of New mexico. He was born October 30th 1927. He was the fifth child of his devote catholic family. His father, Martin Anaya, was a Vaquero and Anaya's mom, Rafaelita Mares, was a Llano or farmer. He grew up living with his grandmother, La Grande, which was also a Curandera. Anaya was only allowed to speak Spanish when he was at home so he became bilingual. At the age of fifteen he moved to Albuquerque and graduated high school there. He went to study at a business school but decided to dropout and got a job teaching. He bagan his book Bless Me, Ultima and took seven years to finish it. It was published in a chicano magazine El Grito and for that he received Premio Quinto Sol Award. He made his second book Heart of Aztlan about youths enetering adulthood.
Bless Me, Ultima
António Arnaut
Yano AnayaIn the summer of 1974, Anaya received a position at the University of New Mexico in the English Department. After that he worked on the board of Coordinating Council of Literary Magazines and wrote his third book Tortuga a book on people looking back on to their religion and culture in times of despair. He became a journalist later on and got awarded for his novel Alburquerque.
This article relates to the book Bless Me, Ultima in that we get to know a bit about the Author. Rudolfo Anaya had a similar childhood to Antonio Marez. His book is like a biography on his childhood and his struggle with growing up. We see similarities in that Antonio and Rudolfos parents are from two different sides of culture and Antonio and Rudolfo being stuck between. Rodulfo also has a grandmother that was a Curandera like in the story.