SOURCE: “The Achievement of Rudolfo A. Anaya,” in The Magic of Words: Rudolfo A. Anaya and His Writings, edited by Paul Vassallo, University of New Mexico Press, 1982, pp. 33–52.

In the following essay, Márquez discusses Anaya's contribution to Chicano literature and provides an overview of the central themes, artistic aims, and critical reception of Bless Me, Ultima, Heart of Aztlán, and Tortuga.

The homage to Rudolfo Anaya comes at an appropriate time. Recently, The New York Times Book Review belatedly granted him national status. Moreover, Anaya's work is on the verge of international recognition. The growing interest in Anaya and other Chicano writers in Latin America and Europe, attended by the expected translations of Bless Me, Ultima into German and Polish, opens new vistas for Chicano literature. Just as Bless Me, Ultima (and Tomás Rivera's Y No Se Lo Tragó La Tierra) formed the vanguard of...