Rudolfo Anaya

“My father was what you would call a cowboy, a vaquero; he worked out in the ranches with cattle. And my mother came from farmers down in the valley.”

“When people ask me where my roots are, I look down at my feet, and I see the roots of my soul grasping the earth. They are here... in the Southwest... I still live in New Mexico.”

“I had been afraid of the awful presence of the river, which was the soul of the river, but through her [Ultima] I learned that my spirit shared in the spirit of all things.”

“I have traveled to many places but have no desire to leave New Mexico.”

“It seemed the more I knew about people the more I knew about the strange magic hidden in their hearts.”

“Why are they like that?' I asked Cico. We skirted Blue Lake and worked our way through the tall, golden grass to the creek.'I don't know,' Cico answered, 'except that people, grown-ups and kids, seem to want to hurt each other - and it's worse when they're in a group.”

“Ultima came to stay with us the summer I was almost seven. When she came the beauty of the llano unfolded before my eyes, and the gurgling waters of the river sang to the hum of the turning earth. The magical time of childhood stood still, and the pulse of the living earth pressed its mystery into my living blood.”

“The orange of the golden carp appeared at the edge of the pond. . . . We watched in silence at the beauty and grandeur of the great fish. Out of the corners of my eyes I saw Cico hold his hand to his breast as the golden carp glided by. Then with a switch of his powerful tail the golden carp disappeared into the shadowy water under the thicket.”

“In many respects, I think 'Bless Me, Ultima' is a novel about the indigenous.”

“There is a time in the last few days of summer when the ripeness of autumn fills the air.”

“To me, the fact that the Mexican came North in search of a better life is a tremendous epic that hasn't been written. It's an odyssey that we know nothing about. And they came with a dream for a better life.”

“The sun was good. The men of the llano were men of the sun. The men of the farms along the river were men of the moon. But we were all children of the white sun.”

“'Bless Me, Ultima' is quite autobiographical in the sense that I was writing a story about my childhood, my hometown where I grew up, Santa Rosa, New Mexico, on Old Highway 66 and the Pecos River. So a great deal of that environment, landscape, people, got thrown in the novel.”

“I used to write at night. I was teaching school, and I was married, and had to do all the things that one does when one is working and has a family. But I used to write at night.”