Voice and Ambivalence in Bless Me Ultima and Baby of the Family Essays

Voice and Ambivalence in Bless Me Ultima and Baby of the Family Bless Me Ultima and Baby of the Family serve as the coming of age stories of deuce minority children. Rudolfo Anaya and Tina McElory Ansa skillfully reveal the richness, diversity, and conflicts that can exist within the Hispanic-American and African-American cultures primarily by the dream sequences in distributively novel. Dreams argon the chemical mechanism used in each work to magnify the individual experiences and conflicts Tony and Lena encounter. In addition and perhaps, more importantly, Tony and Lena deal with ambivalence and find their voices not but through the relationships with other guinea pigs, but through the resolution of their dreams. To truly fall into place how integral and dependent the dreams are in the novels, a few definitions are in order. Dreams are defined, not only as images passing through a sleeping persons mind (Neufeldt 132). Dreams also include the mystical events or dream-like o ccurrences within each novel. Dreams are a way for each character to connect to the past and, perhaps reveal the future. The otherworldly experiences or dreams of Tony and Lena function guide them down the road of ambivalence, and eventually lead to an awakening or the attainment of voice. Websters New World Dictionary defines ambivalence as concurrent conflicting feelings (13). These conflicts can be seen in external situations, and typically acquire serious internal implications. This condition is one of the defining factors of the Hispanic-American experience. Are Hispanics immigrants or minorities? In terms of religion, are they Catholic or Indian? Typically, Hispanic- Americans run low the two choices because neither situation totally applies to them. Perh... ... Once Lena and Tony are harmonise to the swirling adventures that transpire around them, there is a resolution. A rebirth of sorts occurs for each character as they realize that they must take conflicting ideologi es and engagement them together to form individual voices. Works Cited Ansa, Tina McElroy. Interview with Tina McElroy Ansa by Doubleday. admit Group Corner. http//www.randomhouse.com/resources/bookgroup/handifanwith_bgc.html. accessed 30 Oct. 2000. Callahan, John F. In the African-American Grain The interestingness of Voice in Twentieth-Century Black Fiction. University of Illinois Press Urbana and Chicago. 1988. Neufeldt, Victoria, ed. Websters New World thick(p) School and Office Dictionary. 1 vol. to date. MacMillan USA. 1995. Wood, Scott. Book Reviews Bless Me Ultima. Contemporary Literary Criticism. vol. 23 (1983) 22.