Bless Me, Ultima

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1972

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-4

Chapters 5-8

Chapters 9-12

Chapters 13-16

Chapters 17-19

Chapters 20-22

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Chapters 13-16Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 13 Summary

The following morning, the family sets off for El Puerto for another harvest season, and Gabriel joins them for the first time. On the drive, Antonio contemplates whether there is any god who never punishes and always forgives: He decides that the Virgin might fit this description. Antonio then considers his enduring anger at Tenorio and begins to understand why God does not forgive everyone.

In El Puerto, there is a rumor swirling that the remaining Trementinas will soon perform a black mass over the deceased’s sister’s casket. Antonio dreams of the ritual, but instead of the Trementina daughter, he sees Ultima in a coffin.

Upon waking, Antonio witnesses the Trementina funeral procession outside. Tenorio has been cast out of the community and excommunicated from the church, so he must bury his daughter in unholy ground, condemning her soul. Tenorio glares at Ultima, silently swearing revenge.

At the end of the summer, Juan Luna asks Antonio to return to El Puerto alone the following year to learn the lifestyle of the Lunas.

Chapter 14 Summary

School begins again. On the way into town, Antonio meets Samuel and tells him about seeing the golden carp. Samuel warns him that the same people who condemn Ultima will condemn him if they find out about his belief.

Antonio gets into a fight with the boys from town, who call Ultima a witch. Though the fight ends quickly, the boys never bother him about Ultima again.

In December, a cold front sweeps the llano. The school stages a nativity play—Antonio plays a shepherd—but the day of the play is a disaster, with a fight breaking out on stage. Antonio stays behind to clean up, and by the time he leaves for home, the town is mostly empty and embroiled in a snowstorm. On the main street, he encounters Narciso and Tenorio fighting outside a bar: Another one of Tenorio’s daughters has taken ill, and he again blames Ultima. He warns that he is coming for Ultima, and he will kill Narciso if Narciso gets in the way. Narciso responds that he will rip Tenorio’s heart out. Just then, the fight is broken up by the bartender.

Narciso sets off to warn Andrew of Tenorio’s threat. Antonio follows him to Rosie’s brothel and feels sick when Andrew exits the brothel with his arm around a girl. He remembers the dream-Andrew’s promise not to enter the brothel until Antonio lost his innocence and wonders whether he has already lost it due to his experiences with death and the golden carp.

Andrew dismisses Narciso’s frantic warnings about the danger to Ultima and retreats into the brothel, so Narciso resolves to warn Ultima himself. Antonio creeps along behind him as he crosses the bridge, and suddenly, Tenorio appears from under a nearby juniper tree and shoots Narciso down in an ambush attack. When Antonio screams, Tenorio tries to shoot him as well, but he is out of bullets and flees instead.

Antonio kneels by Narciso on the ground. There is no time to get Ultima, so Narciso asks Antonio to bless him. Antonio says the Act of Contrition, and before he dies, Narciso declares him “pure of heart” (17).

Antonio returns home and tells his family what happened. Ultima deduces that he is suffering from a fever and takes him to bed. While he sleeps, Antonio dreams about Andrew walking into hellfire. He prays to God for Andrew and Narciso to be saved, but God refuses to show mercy as they are both sinners. The Virgin appears and proclaims that she will forgive everyone, but Antonio wants her to punish Tenorio: He is trapped by his desire for an all-forgiving god, who will punish only his enemies.

A mob of townspeople appears in Antonio’s dream, crying out for Ultima’s blood. The Trementina sisters are among them, and they put a curse upon Antonio that kills him. The mob burns the Márez house, killing the family. Then they kill the golden carp and are in turn punished by drowning and disease.

Antonio’s dream concludes with all of the townspeople dead. His uncles arrive to bury the familial ashes in holy ground, and the golden carp appears again, having decided that “everyone should survive, but in new form” (176). The carp swallows up the whole world and ascends into the sky, becoming a new sun to shine on the new earth.

Chapter 15 Summary

Antonio stays in bed for several days, recovering from pneumonia. He learns that the coroner ruled Narciso’s death an accident: No one in town really cares about his fate. Antonio mourns that few will remember the goodness of Narciso’s heart.

Christmas comes and goes, and spring arrives. Antonio spends time with Ultima, learning about the old days of the llano, and with his mother, reciting the catechism. He will take his first communion on Easter Sunday and will stay with his uncles in El Puerto the following summer, thus fulfilling María’s dream of having a farmer-priest son.

León and Eugene do not visit for Christmas but arrive some days later in a state police car. They have been living in Las Vegas, and León insisted they visit home despite Eugene’s protests. They reveal that they bought a Chevy together but wrecked it on the way to Las Pasturas.

León and Eugene spend time with Andrew, telling him about their wild and fun-filled lives in Las Vegas. Gabriel is heartbroken to realize that his sons really aren’t coming back home and reminisces about the happy times they spent together before the war. The following day, all three brothers leave for Santa Fe. Antonio wonders if he can ever truly know them, or if they will “remain but phantoms of [his] dreams” (185).

Chapter 16 Summary

School resumes after winter break. Antonio realizes that he is mature now in comparison to his peers. He continues to struggle with the idea that God let Narciso die and allows Tenorio to continue living free. He wonders if God missed the murder because he is “too busy in heaven to worry or care about us” (187).

One day after school, Antonio again runs into Tenorio, who swears revenge on Ultima over his second dying daughter. Antonio says he will not let Tenorio harm Ultima, to which Tenorio replies that Antonio is cursed by too much knowledge.

Ultima assures Antonio that she is not afraid of Tenorio, but Antonio continues to have nightmares about her death.

Chapters 13-16 Analysis

In these chapters, Antonio moves definitively toward adolescence. Though he is still young, his maturation is accelerated by his involvement in traumatic events, like Narciso’s murder. This is the second murder that Antonio has witnessed firsthand, and it is followed by a time of internal turmoil and further tragedy. A pattern is beginning to emerge in Antonio’s life, alternating swaths of peace with times of change and violence. Through Antonio’s development, Anaya is building up the idea that fate is cyclical and balanced.

Antonio uses his brothers as a measure of adulthood and masculinity. Despite his masculine posturing, Andrew displays cowardice when he refuses to help Narciso, choosing instead to stay in the brothel. Antonio is disillusioned to see his older brother display selfishness and cowardice, a realization that coincides with him learning that moral independence and bravery are part of what make a man; in Chapter 9, dream-Andrew waited outside the brothel until Antonio lost his innocence. His entrance into Rosie’s in real life indicates that Antonio’s innocence is already gone.

A more positive side of Antonio’s maturation shows in Chapter 14 when he defends Ultima’s reputation. This moment signals a change in his passive character: Though he still dislikes violence, he is learning to stand up for his morals. His response to Narciso’s death further demonstrates maturity when compared with his reaction at the scene of Lupito’s murder. When Lupito was killed, Antonio fled, too afraid to hold the dying man. As Narciso dies, Antonio kneels by his friend and imparts the final blessing, again stepping into the role of priest, an authority figure. He demonstrates selflessness by remaining in a traumatic situation to ensure his friend can pass away peacefully.

Antonio’s dream in Chapter 14 brings together all of his fears and doubts about the various religious beliefs he’s encountered in an imagined Judgement Day in which his Catholic God will not punish Tenorio without punishing Andrew, for they are both sinners. The Virgin will forgive Andrew, but only if she can forgive Tenorio unconditionally. This dilemma makes Antonio grapple with the paradox of wanting a forgiving God while seeking revenge against his enemies. The Virgin and God both symbolize parts of Antonio, the side of him that knows the wisdom of forgiveness and the side of him that clings to the desire for vengeance: Despite his qualms about the cruelty of eternal punishment, he would happily inflict it on Tenorio.

In the apocalypse dream, Antonio witnesses his own death for the first time. He watches as his soul is condemned to purgatory because he hasn’t yet taken communion, underscoring his anxiety at being in a liminal space between innocence and sin. He’s aware that his purity is gone in the eyes of the church because he has seen too much of life. He continues to wait for the cleansing effect of communion, but as he waits, he is learning more about the golden carp and alternative moral beliefs outside of the church. When he turns to Ultima for advice, she encourages him to “find [his] own truths” (119), guiding him toward moral independence.

In the dream’s ending, in which the golden carp swallows the townspeople and becomes a sun shining on a new world, Anaya explores the idea of death as part of a cycle which facilitates rebirth. This dream also foreshadows Antonio’s eventual conclusion that he can use the traditions of the past to create a better future.