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Antonio's Alienation in Bless Me, Ultima

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Antonio's Alienation in Bless Me, Ultima
Antonio is Alienated

I believe that in the novel Bless Me, Ultima Antonio is an alienated individual. He doesn't seem to act like any of the other kids his age and has been through so much more then they have. For example, Antonio is torn between making his mother happy and becoming a priest, or making his father happy and becoming a cowboy type figure. He also has experienced a lot of death in his life to people he cared deeply about. I believe that Antonio is alienated because he has the mind of an adult, he is the only one who can talk to Ultima, and he can see the future.

Oddly, Antonio is the only one who understands Ultima. For example, in the beginning of the book Antonio shook Ultima's hand and he could sense the power of a whirlwind pass through him. Also, Ultima declares that only she will know what the future holds for Antonio. In the novel I noticed that Ultima rarely talks to anyone except for Antonio, he probably possesses something that no one else has. Sometimes Antonio and Ultima would work out in the garden and talk about what is going on in Antonio's life. This makes me think that Antonio has some sort of special powers like Ultima if they understand each other so well. Throughout the book, Antonio has many dreams and some of his dreams tell about things that happen in the future. His dreams often foreshadow into what's going to happen in the next chapter. For instance, Antonio dreams of his brothers returning home from the war and the next day his brothers came home. Antonio also dreams that the owl flies the Virgin of Guadeloupe and all the babes of Limbo go to heaven. This power that he possesses is not human like and is considered abnormal. For some reason Antonio could see the golden carp even though he was mature mentally. Only kids are supposes to be able to see the golden carp. Children's minds still believe in things such as the golden carp, so Antonio has to be alienated for him to be able to see the carp

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