Rudolfo Anaya, the Magic of Words Rudolfo Anaya, the renowned Chicano author, is widely regarded as one of the most influential writers of Mexican-American literature. Born on October 30, 1937, in New Mexico, Anaya's works beautifully capture the essence of the Chicano experience while incorporating elements of magical realism and the power of storytelling. Anaya's most celebrated novel, "Bless Me, Ultima," published in 1972, is a coming-of-age story set in rural New Mexico during World War II. The novel follows Antonio Marez y Luna, a young boy navigating the complexities of cultural and religious identity. Through magical and spiritual encounters with the curandera Ultima, Anaya masterfully weaves together themes of tradition, faith, and the duality of good and evil. "Bless Me, Ultima" is a testament to Anaya's ability to transport readers to a world where the supernatural coexists with reality.
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Consequently, all horned animals can be thought of as potentially the horned one and this is what we find in the scant evidence available to us today. The art work seems to be derived from a 1628 publication entitled Robin Good-Fellow short title and the original figure is graphically virile, reinforcing the previously-mentioned phallic imagery.
"Bless Me, Ultima" is a testament to Anaya's ability to transport readers to a world where the supernatural coexists with reality. Another notable work by Anaya is "Alburquerque," published in 1992. This novel delves into the lives of various characters in the city of Albuquerque and explores themes of identity, love, and betrayal.
"Through the unknown, unremembered gate. "
He bears horns, ‘cernu’ in Celtic, he is literally a horned man, Kernunnos, the horned one, which is just a descriptive, it is not his name, it is an adjective. He is half man, half beast, those breeks belong more to Pan than they do to Kernunnos, but anything with horns will do – cloven feet are fine – but it’s the headgear which identifies him. Only Pan (Faunus) comes close to this in the Graeco-Roman world. The God Pan. So what else is there? There’s music, [top link, centre right] , and music is often important in Celtic Britain, the image of the harp for example, and the magical singing birds of Rhiannon. It would be odd to find any indigenous folk tradition then without music featuring in it.
[Circle of Demons and Witches, Nathaniel Crouch, The Kingdom of Darkness, 1688.]What else? The phallic broomstick and phallic torch or candle, so there is fire symbolism, which compliments the circle – usually a symbol for the sun (wheel). And what else – people dancing in a ring and drinking jugs, indicating feasting, so this is also a god of plenty, and a god of fertility. The Sacred Circle. Then what can we find in Britain and, or Ireland, to match this otherwise bewildering figure? The art work seems to be derived from a 1628 publication entitled “Robin Good-Fellow” (short title) and the original figure is graphically virile, reinforcing the previously-mentioned phallic imagery. By the 17th century Robin was a name for the regent of the fair folk, the King of Faery, but we need to delve much further back and earlier in time to identify this elusive fellow
There are several contenders I think for the god of the witches in Celtic Brtain and Ireland. We have already noted the horns, the stag god’s antlers; but during the later medieval period there are repeated references to the devil being black, for example, “a very mickle [large], black rough man" claimed Isobel Gowdie in 1662 [1] . So step forward swart god! Not so simple though: Celtic belief was regional, it was tribal, the deities do not fall into neat categories and I believe their gods may overlap to quite an extent, quite unlike the classical pantheon with its apparently well defined Olympians.
But black, or rather dark; an obvious match could well be the Irish Donn whose name gives us the adjective ‘dun’. This is a dark god of the Celtic underworld, but he is possibly more than that as well. Julius Caesar [2] stated that the Celtic equivalent of his ‘Dis Pater’ was considered to be the ancestor of the Gauls, and so a very major figure, and Dis Pater was the god of the Roman underworld, so we may have a parallel dark Donn figure here. In Wales, the medieval Mabinogion affords us a glimpse of another large dark figure, a pillar-like ‘black man of great stature on the top of a mound’ grasping a stag and a club [3] . The club or cudgel is also an attribute of Gaulish Sucellous (‘good striker’) and the Irish Dagda, called 'The Good God' and the ‘All-Father’ bringing us back to Julius’ comment again. Equally, the Dagda has been poetically referred to as ‘Donn’ which can mean brown or dark [4] , exactly the same adjective used to describe the Donn Cuailgne or great brown bull featuring in the epic Irish Tain saga – yes, those horns again.
But returning to the Good-Fellow imagery – especially the circle - and our quest for the dark figure, perhaps the Witches’ God. Besides Kernunnos and the Dagda as sometimes dark, ancestral and fertility deities in the broad Celtic pantheon, a third personage presents himself. This is Crom Dubh, ‘dubh’ meaning black [5] . The word ‘crom’ forms Welsh ‘cromlech’ meaning curved stone, in other words a stone circle. Crom Dubh may have also been known as Crom Cruach, which would tend to identify him with the hilltop god Lugh (Lleu) who has an agricultural and harvest association. The god Lugaid - perhaps related to Lugh - is a tricephalic diety just like Kernunnos – he can be depicted with three heads or faces.
I return to the dancing circle though because Crom Dubh, whom Michael J O’Kelly calls the chief Celtic idol of Ireland [6] , is associated with several stone circles, and I do not see this as coincidental. Aubrey Burl informs us that the stone circle in County Cavan known as Crom Cruach or Crom Dubh was a circle of twelve standing stones with a taller monolith in the centre. The central stone appears to have been thought of as the god Crom Cruach himself. A second stone circle in the same county has a Crom Cruach association and that is at Killycluggin. This circle also appears to have possessed a central pillar. Both circles have been deliberately destroyed in antiquity and the question of Crom Dubh’s identity has been all but effaced [7] . However, the ‘mickle black man’ of the seventeenth century – the Witches’ God of the round dance, and the many megalithic monuments credited with witch associations, suggests to me that the chthonic Kernunnos – variously named and conceived of - was indeed the God of the Witches
From the Compendium Maleficarum by Francesco Maria Guazzo, (1608).
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Kernunnos only means ‘horned’ it doesn’t mean anything else, it doesn’t refer to any particular animal at all. Consequently, all horned animals can be thought of as potentially the ‘horned one’ and this is what we find in the scant evidence available to us today. Where clearly represented Celtic male horned figures appear they are antlered (stags) or associated with horns like the ‘ram horned’ serpents frequently accompanying the chthonic god. Bovids are less acknowledged as horned divinities, but the Celtic bull was esteemed, as in the Tain, and a bull deity existed even though his nature is now as altogether shadowy as the erstwhile major divinity Crom Dubh in Ireland. The bull god was named Tarvos who is depicted as Tarvos Trigaranus on the 1st century Pillar of the Boatmen (an altar) at Cluny, France; immediately beneath this panel is a representation of Kernunnos with apparent stag’s antlers over which are looped torcs. I think this further suggests the interrelatedness of Celtic male horned figures, all being seen as facets of Kernunnos.
The Dagda as a major pre-Christian figure is described in the Tochmarc Étaíne [8] as having power over the storm which would tend to identify him as originally an archaic weather god, and his cudgel or club [9] parallels Indra’s axe, Thunor’s hammer and the thunder bolt of Zeus. In this way these deities have something in common with anciently bovine lunar* gods like the Anatolian Teshub, consort of the sun goddess of Arinna, and Sumerian Nanna /Sin – another ‘father of the gods’ figure - who rode a winged bull. The god’s consort Ningal was represented by a priestess who led a white cow and is thought to have performed a ritual to the east or even the rising sun; the priestess is named ‘ornament of the heavens’ and embodied the person of the goddess [10] . Considering the sacred issue between Nanna/Sin and Ningal was the sun it is probable that Ningal was a solar cow goddess, recalling ancient Egyptian Hathor and the cow goddess Aditi who births the sun in the mythology of India. Bovine Nanna/Sin’s symbol was the crescent moon, reflecting his twin albescent crescent horns.
In general, the educated seventeenth century Establishment – the clergy, aristocracy and the judiciary, could only interpret the remnants of paganism, which were all around them, in terms of classical learning and the Bible. Thus the Witch God became the Christian Devil often depicted with Pan-like goat’s legs and feet. But it follows that the god of the witches was largely an archaic moon and fertility god, and that he was consequently worshipped at night. Indeed, recumbent stone circles in northern Britain are believed to reference the moon [11] . Elsewhere the solar nature of stone circ les and related megalithic monuments is beyond serious dispute and there are too many documented sun alignments to call this into question, even accepting that some megalithic monuments remain obscure in terms of archeoastronomy. The examples of Stonehenge and Newgrange will always stand, and importantly so [12] . That many daylight traditions may have been erased, must be accepted, just as the Brythonic sun goddess Sulis is all but ignored in the modern period; we are left with the nocturnal god of the witches – a surviving folk memory - but without his consort the sun goddess, whose identity was probably overlain and absorbed by Roman Minerva in the late Iron Age and then Mary ‘The Queen of Heaven’ in the succeeding Christian period, and it remains for us to recover our lost heritage.
But black, or rather dark; an obvious match could well be the Irish Donn whose name gives us the adjective ‘dun’. This is a dark god of the Celtic underworld, but he is possibly more than that as well. Julius Caesar [2] stated that the Celtic equivalent of his ‘Dis Pater’ was considered to be the ancestor of the Gauls, and so a very major figure, and Dis Pater was the god of the Roman underworld, so we may have a parallel dark Donn figure here. In Wales, the medieval Mabinogion affords us a glimpse of another large dark figure, a pillar-like ‘black man of great stature on the top of a mound’ grasping a stag and a club [3] . The club or cudgel is also an attribute of Gaulish Sucellous (‘good striker’) and the Irish Dagda, called 'The Good God' and the ‘All-Father’ bringing us back to Julius’ comment again. Equally, the Dagda has been poetically referred to as ‘Donn’ which can mean brown or dark [4] , exactly the same adjective used to describe the Donn Cuailgne or great brown bull featuring in the epic Irish Tain saga – yes, those horns again.
Anaya's depiction of the city acts as a microcosm for the struggles faced by Chicanos in the United States. Through his vivid prose and rich character development, Anaya invites readers to reflect on the complexities of race, culture, and societal expectations. Anaya's writing style is characterized by his use of magical realism, a literary genre that combines realistic narrative with elements of the fantastical. Within his novels, Anaya seamlessly intertwines the supernatural with the everyday, resulting in a sense of wonder and enchantment. This unique blend of reality and myth creates a distinct atmosphere in his works, inviting readers to explore the magical aspects of life. In addition to his novels, Anaya has also written numerous children's books, poetry collections, and plays. His body of work reflects his profound connection to his cultural roots and his commitment to representing the Chicano experience through literature. Rudolfo Anaya's impact on the literary world cannot be understated. Through his eloquent prose and masterful storytelling, he has captured the hearts of readers around the world. His ability to uncover the magic within words serves as an inspiration to aspiring writers and a testament to the power of storytelling. With his contributions to Mexican-American literature, Anaya has left an indelible mark on the literary landscape, forever enchanting readers with his words..
Reviews for "The Multigenerational Storytelling Tradition in Rudolfo Anaya's Novels"
1. Jennifer - 2/5 - I was really disappointed with "The Magic of Words" by Rudolfo Anaya. I found the plot to be confusing and disjointed, with too many different storylines trying to come together. The characters also felt very one-dimensional and lacked depth, making it difficult to connect with them. Additionally, I found the writing style to be overly descriptive and repetitive, which made the pace of the book drag on. Overall, I had high expectations for this novel, but it just didn't live up to them.
2. Mark - 1/5 - I couldn't finish "The Magic of Words" by Rudolfo Anaya. The book was extremely slow and boring, and I couldn't get invested in the story or the characters. The writing style felt overly pretentious and self-indulgent, with long, rambling paragraphs that seemed to go nowhere. I tried to push through and give it a chance, but after several chapters, I couldn't bear it anymore. This was a major disappointment for me, as I had heard great things about Anaya's work, but unfortunately, this book just didn't resonate with me.
3. Laura - 2/5 - I found "The Magic of Words" by Rudolfo Anaya to be a bit underwhelming. While the premise of the story had potential, I felt that the execution fell flat. The pacing was uneven, with long periods of slow development and sudden bursts of action that felt disjointed. Additionally, I found the dialogue to be stilted and unrealistic, which made it difficult for me to become fully immersed in the story. Overall, I was hoping for a more captivating and engaging read, but unfortunately, this book didn't meet my expectations.