The Godfather (Signet)
by Mario Puzo
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Book Summary Information
Author: Mario PuzoEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1983-09-01
ISBN: 0451167716
Number of pages: 496
Publisher: Signet
Book Reviews of The Godfather (Signet)
Book Review: MARIO PUZO'S GODFATHER...THE BOOK THAT GAVE THE EXPRESSION NEW MEANING
Summary: 5 Stars
The Webster's Reference Library Dictionary defines the word Godfather as `A male godparent, who sponsors a child at baptism, taking responsibility for its faith.' But Mario Puzo in his classic novel brings another dimension to this definition. What is it about Vito Corleone, the main character, that captures our imagination and gives him such a larger-than-life image? What is it about Corleone that makes him The Godfather?
Is it because he's so good in his chosen career? He gets a powerful Hollywood movie producer to `reason' with him when the man wakes up terrified to find the bloody head of his favourite horse in bed with him. He thwarts Al Capone himself, who tries to send men to fight in a war against him, by dispatching his own fearsome henchman, Luca Brazi, to meet Capone's men at the train station with instructions that liberate Brazi's wildest instincts. He builds a vast criminal empire, the reaches of which many times catch his enemies, and even his closest friends, by surprise.
Is it in the way he carries himself? With dignity and the deepest self-respect. He's faithful to his wife and becomes straitlaced whenever the discussion comes round to sex. You could say, ironically, that he has a certain moral rectitude. And yet we see in all his transactions that he's not your usual run of criminal. His motivation can't be said to be greed or money, but something else...something more profound.
Is it because he is influential and has countless friends from various walks of life? Friendship is everything, he counsels a protégé. It is more than money. It is the equivalent of power...And Vito Corleone cherishes his friends deeply. He is generous with them and offers them his own `justice', whenever society fails them.
Corleone is all these things - a mastermind, honourable and influential - but a clue to what really separates him from the pack lies in a conversation he has with Tom Hagen, his consigliore (adviser), about the producer who refused to feature his protégé in a movie. Does this man have balls? the don asks Hagen. Hagen, knowing the don's standards are different from everyone else's, ponders what the question really means before he attempts to answer. Does the movie mogul have a strong will? Does he wield immense power? (The CIA Director is his personal friend.) The answer to these questions is yes. Hagen then ups the stakes: Will this man risk losing everything, including his life, just to defend a principle - as a matter of pride? Hagen smiles and then gives the godfather his answer: No.
Pride...personal, family and `professional' pride...that is the undercurrent that runs through this book. It is this quality, and the bid to control his own destiny in a society of suspect standards, that drives a man of such positive attributes to a life of crime, Puzo tells us. And it is this same quality that Vito looks for as he seeks a successor. He considers his sons: Sony is too brash; too erratic (it is his brashness that kills him in the end). Fredo is too timid, and his fidelity is questionable (more than once he takes sides with strangers against his own family). It is Michael, who has the same high intelligence and cold fearlessness as his father, that the don favours. But Michael is just a gentle, unassuming university kid who prefers to become a maths professor. That is until his father is shot, his family besieged, and his face disfigured by a police captain. Then Michael himself undergoes the traumatic life-changing experience that sets him, like his father before him, on the path to self-realization - to becoming the Godfather.
Godfather - a male godparent who sponsors a child at baptism, taking responsibility for its faith - these days, thanks to Mario Puzo, the word conjures rather different images - images of extraordinary leadership, enormous influence and exaggerated power - at times bordering on notoriety. Mr Puzo writes a book that, though built around the Mafia (I read an interview once where he swore he doesn't have a thing to do with them), explores the traits that command influence and followership among men anywhere - courage, competence, character and community. Reading this book also makes us examine ourselves in the light of these virtues. The Godfather...It is one of the few novels I've finished in a single sitting - for its very absorption, and it must also be the book I've reread the most...A real work of genius.
Summary of The Godfather (Signet)
When Mario Puzo's blockbuster saga, The Godfather, was first published in 1969, critics hailed it as one of the greatest novels of our time, and "big, turbulent, highly entertaining." Since then, The Godfather has gone on to become a part of America's national culture, as well as a trilogy of landmark motion pictures. Now, in this newly-repackaged 30th Anniversary Edition, readers old and new can experience this timeless tale of crime for themselves. From the lavish opening scene where Don Corleone entertains guests and conducts business at his daughter's wedding...to his son, Michael, who takes his father's place to fight for his family...to the bloody climax where all family business is finished, The Godfather is an epic story of family, loyalty, and how "men of honor" live in their own world, and die by their own laws.
The story of Don Vito Corleone, the head of a New York Mafia family, inspired some of the most successful movies ever. It is in Mario Puzo's The Godfather that Corleone first appears. As Corleone's desperate struggle to control the Mafia underworld unfolds, so does the story of his family. The novel is full of exquisitely detailed characters who, despite leading unconventional lifestyles within a notorious crime family, experience the triumphs and failures of the human condition. Filled with the requisite valor, love, and rancor of a great epic, The Godfather is the definitive gangster novel.
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