The Godfather’s Switch
An Interview between Gabriel and Vito Andolini formerly known as Don Vito Corleone, Part 1
by Pasquale Scopelliti
Interviewer: Gabriel Andolini
Interviewee: Vito Andolini
Vito Andolini, known to the world as Don Vito Corleone, has remained here with us on this side of the
great veil since he died in 1955. His soul cannot depart. This is partially due to unfinished purposes not
fulfilled while he lived. It is also due to his continuing great influence for both good and ill upon our world.
Before he passes forward, he has been granted the dispensation to improve upon his earthy contribution.
He has, in fact, been commanded that he must do so.
After many years of solitary struggle, making little progress in this in between state, Vito longed for,
desperately needed and was allowed the comfort and company of his wife Carmela. She had fully
passed through to the other side but, with pain not comprehensible to the living, Carmela opted to return
of her own free will. In death as in life, Carmela cares far more and fears more for Vito’s soul than she
cares for or serves herself. It may be that her efforts on his behalf were a factor in the additional time he
has received.
Once reunited in the afterlife, Vito and Carmela brought forth the spirit of a new son, whom they named
Gabriel Andolini. Gabriel currently exists very happily in a condition that can with some accuracy be
named “pre-birth,” as a “pre-embodied soul.” As such, he awaits the right moment to incarnate and begin
his course of fleshly, material life. The great modern prophet James Hillman – so recently passed
through himself – and his visions are given testimony by the very existence of the following interview.
Those who are alert will heed his words.
Carmela will be not joining Gabriel and Vito in the following interview, but her spirit will be present. It may
not be easy to do, but if you attune your heart to Carmela’s emotions, and picture her wifely and maternal
care for her men, you too may be able to intuit the power of her love by closely observing the interaction
of her two beloveds.
The interview itself will be transcribed by Pasquale Scopelliti who also will not enter into the conversation
today, directly. Pasquale’s pre-interview pledge to Carmela was that he will convey Gabriel’s and Vito’s
exact words, thoughts and emotions.
The interview is formal, on the record, and therefore neither Vito nor Gabriel will use terms of familiarity.
Gabriel knows his father very well, and so will know the answer to some of questions in advance, but not
all. As you will see, he too looks forward with great interest to significant learning as we do.
For the structure of the interview, Gabriel is using the original version of The Switch. If you are not
familiar with this powerful interviewing format, you may procure your own copy here: The Switch
A word on the style and pattern of Vito’s speech will be helpful. In the decades since Carmela rejoined
him, Vito has continued to invest into his education as well as utterly dedicated himself to his post-life
mission. This has required him to learn and practice many new and different ways of study and being. In
this, Vito has grown notably more careful in his efforts at explaining things thoroughly. Unlike previously,
Vito now works hard to skip no detail or nuance. Vito now believes that if a point can be missed, it will be,
and thus struggles to ensure that this cannot happen through lack of articulation on his part. Even slower
in his speaking now than before, he opts to err on the side of too much explanation as opposed to too
little. He won’t discuss it today, but one of his new mottos is to never leave even the smallest stone
unturned. We will learn some other reasons for this shift in the interview.
Yet be assured, if you look past or perhaps underneath this, you will certainly recognize the familiar Don
Corleone. The difference is that his style is evolving for new purposes, but not changing fundamentally.
Ah, here are our interviewer and interviewee now…
Gabriel: Hello Don Vito, father, thank you for joining us today.
Vito: It is a pleasure, Gabriel; I have long contemplated sharing some aspects of the
inner story of my life. I hope to correct certain misunderstandings as well as speak to
some of my worst errors, the evils and stupidities of which I was guilty in life. Also,
there is a critical mission I now desire to achieve. I look forward to our conversation
today as a step in that direction
Can we begin with your name?
Certainly.
The world knows you by the name Vito Corleone. If you don’t mind my
asking, why did you change it to Vito Andolini and what does this change
mean to you?
To understand, you have to realize that the name I go by now was, in fact, my original
name. Many know the story of how my name was changed as a young boy, but I will
cover it for those of our listeners who may not.
My father was Antonio Andolini; my older brother’s name was Paolo. Both of them
were killed when I was 12 years old by our Padrone, Don Ciccio. Consequently, my
mother arranged for me to escape from Sicilia and come to America. In these efforts,
my mother too was killed and I was utterly alone. Yes we did have friends who helped,
or I would never have made it to the ship. They too risked their lives.
Still but a young boy, I could not help myself nor stop my weeping. Until I arrived at
the ship, I could not allow the sounds of my sobbing to be heard by others for fear of
detection. Once on the ship, I could not let others witness my tears for fear of shame. I
wept in solitude, terror and silence throughout my journey, until there were no tears
left in me. You will understand that this weeping and its completion was also the
beginning, for me, of becoming a man.
On the ship I contracted a mild form of tuberculosis. As a result, I was quarantined on
Ellis Island for three months.
Don Ciccio’s power extended across the ocean. His willing friends in New York would
have found and killed me if I had not been held on the island so long. When the
officials confused my village name for my family name, this small fact gave me
fortunate and possibly providential safety. With my new name as my shield of
invisibility, I survived my boyhood. I don’t remember precisely when, but the
cleverness of this pleased my young heart once I realized the source of my apparent
safety. That pleasure was the seed of my ultimate revenge against Don Ciccio, many
years later.
In manhood, I kept my village name for sentimental reasons, as well as for reasons of
business. Then, after the somewhat famous attack of Virgilio Sollozzo where I was
shot many times, I never fully regained my health. The resulting loss of my beloved
Santino weighed always on my heart and soul. Full responsibility for Santino’s death
lay only at my own feet. What broke my sprit most, though, was my failure to protect
my daughter Constanza from the vile boy, Carlo, may he rot in hell for all time. Please
forgive me. It was this great failure that led to my death.
Having given up the ghost, I trusted my son Michele to take care of the family, and I
passed on. But, I was not free to leave this world.
I’ll pass over the story, Gabriel, of how you and I came to be as we are, for another
day. But, I will share that it was actually not me, but rather our friend and my
beloved Godson Pasquale Scopelliti who gave me back my original name. In this, I
agree completely, and these were Pasquale’s main reasons.
First, in my life as Vito Corleone, I did not realize until too late how much I loved to
teach. There were many reasons for this, not least my natural personality which was
never one of many words. Perhaps more importantly, you must remember that silence
and invisibility were the very instruments of my survival throughout my life. But
afterward, when I accepted the task of helping Pasquale in his great life change, he
realized that I was simply too silent to meet his needs. As he contemplated this, and
studied my life story, he came to the simple conclusion that it was now completely safe
for me to resume my original name. In this, he decided to help me lot go of the
methods of my past, in order to move forward in the present.
As he and I discussed my name, a new possibility began to arise in my heart. It was, I
began to suspect, for the mandate of this very change that I had been required to
remain after I died. I realized that Pasquale’s need from me was a window into my
new mission. Since, I have come to believe that my new name, my original name holds
this very purpose within itself. Perhaps I should attempt to share this purpose now?
On yes, certainly, please do indeed.
While alive, I failed to find a path to meet all needs, both material and spiritual. It was
not enough to attempt to me the needs of safety – to the degree I succeeded at that – or
the needs of money and business, or even the needs of my many friends in all I did for
them. My failure was to build a path that included all these things but that also led the
way to a better world as a whole. The world outside, each man’s world, is but a
reflection of his inner being. So I now realize that I needlessly allowed myself in life to
remain a weaker, more foolish, more prideful and more evil man than I ever
recognized until it was too late.
Here’s an example. Consider the principle of gratitude: No soul can thrive
without gratitude.
Now, think of all the judges and police whom I bribed so successfully. I do not judge
them or myself in this, in any absolute way. The question holds no easy answers. But,
where I failed was to picture the ultimate consequences of his corruption on each judge
or policeman. No, not in any given single moment, per se, but rather over the sweep of
his life. What about the consequences of this on his family? Then, from there, what
meaning does this have for the greater world at large?
When a man uses his power corruptly, he knows in his own soul what he has
done. Such an act cannot be removed from the soul without actual change. Or,
shall I say, each such act writes itself upon the soul. How can a man be
grateful, as his soul is requires, for that which he gained corruptly? In this, he
removes himself from God’s grace, but perhaps more importantly from his own
grace.
I’m not sure how to express this, but perhaps there is such a thing as good and
bad corruption. If while I lived I had clearly analyzed this, I would certainly
have thought that I only engaged in the good form. In this, I now know I would
have been wrong. Perhaps it is not possible to draw the right line over this in
life, I am not sure. Much work on this is required.
No, I know it was not my job to perfect the world, or to wipe out corruption. And, the
actions that I took can in no way be judged all bad, this case cannot be made. But, that
I accepted the world of corruption as it was, benefited from it, extended it, invested my
life’s energy into it and never built a dream of a better world, this was the foolish
peasant in me never allowing me to truly wake up.
Thus, when Pasquale offered to give back my original name, a new part of my soul
awakened. I began to dream a new dream; a better dream than any that I lived for in
life. I should have dreamed of a less corrupt world. I should have dreamed of a world
both wiser and better and built up out of the stone of integrity instead of perpetually
sliding along the muddy path of corruption.
Thank you Don Vito, that completely satisfies my curiosity on that score.
Let us move to our main topic for the day.
While I’d truly love to hear more about your current vision, and I’m sure it
will come up, we have a different focus for today. Our task is to uncover
and clarify the dream that you did live for, for better and for worse, while
you were alive. We also wish to learn how you went about fighting your
battles, both external and especially your internal ones.
Perhaps a good place for us to begin is with one of the principles you always
taught, “Each man has but one destiny.” Why did you believe that? How
did you come to be so sure of it? And, with the 20/20 hindsight you now
enjoy, does that principle still hold for you in the afterlife as it did while you
lived? Does this principle tie to the dream you lived for in life?
That is an excellent starting point, Gabriel. And yes, it ties to and undergirds the
dream I lived for very significantly. In fact, you have rightly realized that to
understand the dreams I lived for you must understand this principle.
I can’t remember exactly if I was 13 or 14 or maybe even a little older when the first
glimpses of that principle began to dawn upon my mind. I can tell you when the
principle settled into certainty for me, and I will in a moment. It will not be a surprise
to you.
In my youth I always enjoyed work. The Abbandando family was wonderful to me
and the clever brightness of my friend and brother Genco always put smiles upon my
face. He always saw the answer to even the trickiest questions. For example, I
struggled with organizing my deliveries for the groceria for many months.
Unbeknownst to me at first, Genco often followed me and slowly, carefully analyzed
what I did. When he finally spoke to me he said he could make my life much easier. I
said nothing, but he knew he had my full attention. So, he simply wrote down all the
addresses that I should go to first. I did, and returned. This took a great deal less time
than it had previously. We did this several more times and then, smiling, he asked me
if I understood
I did, and I never missed even the smallest delivery again, since I knew how to
organize my sequence.
You might ask, what does this have to do with a man’s one destiny? In contemplating
Genco’s lesson, I realized that I would never have learned how to make efficient
deliveries if I had stayed in beautiful Sicilia. As the steps that led me to that moment
lined up in my mind, it was clear that there was but one path that I had been walking.
What if, instead of being a grocer, Papa Abbandando had been a butcher? Would such
a small difference have altered my path? Surely it would. Or, what if instead of being
so clever, warm, confident and joyful, Genco had a different nature?
At that point I began to invest myself into my work more intensely, and Genco did too.
The groceria prospered. It was several years, before the abundance of our success –
and yes, Abbandando does mean abundance – brought us to the attention of that great
fool, Don Fanucci. Everyone remembers that I killed him, although few seem to have
followed the real story itself. This, of course, I understand. A man’s reasons, and the
factors behind his life decisions do make for a wonderful book, and honor must always
be given to the great writer Mario Puzo who so effectively told my story.
Mario completely understood, and explains all my reasons for this act to perfection.
But, the power of Francis Coppola’s movie is so great it in many ways wipes out the
significance of Puzo’s work. The images of my story seem more powerful even to me
when I watch the movie than they do in my own recollection. My reasons for killing
Don Fanucci, though, do not come through as completely in the film as they do in
Puzo’s book. The difference is subtle, but I believe quite important. It’s not that
Coppola gets it wrong over this matter, not at all. He simply had to cut much, and a
film cannot reveal what a book can.
Still, Puzo explains with perfect clarity how my job was destroyed by Fanucci. Puzo,
wonderful story teller that he is, gives the simple facts and does not linger. The
moment requires a bit longer contemplation, though.
By the time I grew to adulthood, my memories of life in our village of Corleone were
almost all gone. Yes, I remember my father and brother’s death. Yes, of course I
remember my mother’s sacrifice and the journey to America. But, life before that grew
distant and eventually blurred completely. The only real life I knew was with the
Abbandando family. For all my hard work, and for all the confidence with which I
married the lovely Carmela and started my family, I still had not awakened to life to
have a vision or a plan. I simply – really without thinking – assumed I would always
work for the Abbandando family. I had no image of new stores being opened, or
expansion. I had no picture of Genco’s life until and after his father finally died and he
took over the family business. I simply knew or perhaps vaguely assumed that all this
or some other equally automatic series of outcomes would occur, but gave no mind
space, no thought or consideration to any of it. My soul’s striving remained for
survival, although I did not think as deeply about survival as I should have, having
grown less fearful as the years had passed. Not greatly, but enough to matter.
There is a type of dull sleep that can fall over even the most insecure souls, if enough
time goes by without living, present and active threat. That souls require danger for
awakening gives me great awe for the design of our world. Souls require danger, and
there is so very much of it
I loved my work, and felt honor in it. I happily gave my pay envelope to Carmela
unopened each week. I did not spend so much as the cost of a drink on the way home
from work. I saw all the weak men who squandered their every nickel, and saw the
lives of their wives and children. I looked down on these men for their weakness and
lack of care, lack of strength.
In all this, still, I had no dream for myself in any clear sense. Perhaps I had been so
overtaken by the dream of survival when I immigrated as a boy, and I was so
overwhelmed by the loss of my entire family that survival itself, not even safety, was
the only dream I knew.
What first stirred my awakening was Don Fanucci’s decision to dip his beak more
deeply into the Abbandando well. I had seen the small extortions he committed before,
and it always surprised me that Papa Abbandando tolerated it. Genco too could never
figure this out, for all his logical powers. But, when Don Fanucci demanded that Papa
Abbandando hire his nephew; when I saw that it was no longer possible for the
Abbandando family to pay me for my work; it was only then that I realized how little
power in this world I had built.
It was then that I most doubted my destiny. The pain and self-attack of that moment is
something that I can never fully express. The nightmares that overwhelmed me were
far, far worse than any dreams of death or execution by Don Ciccio from my past. The
memory of these horrors never left me. In spite of the power and success I amassed in
later years, I always felt a great bond of affection to a suffering man who doubted his
path. It was for this reason that my commitment to my friends was always so firm. It
was for this reason that I refused to make the excuses I saw others make, never feeling
the pain of their fellow men. I could never know that I had power to help and refuse do
so for a friend. The pain of those weeks after I lost my job never left me. I can still feel
that pain right now, as if it were my struggle in this very moment.
Then, the events that both Puzo and Coppola do such a great job retelling occurred,
from my meeting of Pietro Clemenza to our efforts in strong-arming the silk dresses, to
my ultimate decision to kill Fanucci. Puzo reports my thinking in its most analytical,
clear form, and in this he does a perfect job. But, what he glosses over, almost as if it
did not occur, was the raging inner fire of my anger. When I first considered that the
very man who destroyed my life and threatened my family required that we pay
money to him for the right to risk our lives, my mind truly did explode. Clemenza,
Tessio and I faced the loss of our freedom for the chance to make a few dollars. What
did Fanucci do to earn the right to our money?
Puzo does share that Santino’s fate was set by his observation of my actions the day I
killed Fanucci. But, what Mario never understood, or if so, he kept his silence about,
was that Santino’s problem with anger did not come either from that day alone or
from his mother! Part of my great failure with Santino was that I always saw my own
anger raging within his heart. I never understood this. I understood the emotion.
What I never understood was the lack of control, the lack of separation disconnecting
as it should an emotion from the instant action the emotion so forcefully impels. At my
worst, I was never a slave of my emotions. Even when my mind was most clouded,
least accessible to me for proper thinking, I always knew it would return.
Ah, but it was my father’s rage that Santino inherited, and of course my brother
Paolo’s, and the rage of all Sicilians who give their lives over to their emotions. Yet, in
my son, I never understood it.
Before I could even employ my mind’s powers to analyze my rightful relationship to
Fanucci, I first had to allow wave after wave of rage to pass over and through my
heart.
I can’t tell you if this was days or minutes. I can tell you that the dawning of my belief
in my own destiny arose during this process. It was this moment of new clarity,
confidence and truth that was the real awakening of my life as a man
I must be clear, to this moment I have no regret and great pride for the fact that I
killed Fanucci. Man is given a choice. This is not for no reason. We may say, with all
humility, that it was God himself, our Father, who planted the Tree of Knowledge of
Good and Evil in the Garden. It was He who created its fruit. Many will disagree with
me. But, I believe that it was God our Father who created the serpent, and even He
who spoke through the voice of the serpent. If you read carefully you will see that
every word of the serpent’s mouth is proven to be completely true.
By this means choice, consideration over cause and consequence entered into the
world in the mind and actions of man. That there is evil in this world cannot be
disputed. That men must choose what to do about evil is certain. That men must kill in
order to fight evil cannot be intelligently denied. That I chose, in honor, to kill Fanucci
is beyond doubt, and to this very moment I hold no regret. I have rather great pride
over that action.
Yet, to say that I knew my destiny at that point would be completely wrong. I did not.
I knew that my destiny required that action, that choice. Still, I had no vision of my
future. But the beginnings of such a dream were in the works. It was my wife
Carmela who saw my one destiny and the path forward, not me.
With his powerful story-telling simplicity, Puzo indicates that Carmela brought her
friend, Mrs. Colombo to me, who needed my help. Perhaps my wife knew what
everyone else in our neighborhood knew. It was not possible for me to execute Don
Fanucci without some part of his life force, his soul, his destiny entering into my own.
In that moment of youthful transformation I was perhaps not as blind as most young
men, but still in complete need of the wisdom of my wife and neighbors in seeing who I
was and by what means I would earn my living in the world.
In the days following my encounter with Don Roberto, Mrs. Colombo’s landlord, and
with each new person who came to ask my help, the clarity of my destiny grew
greater, more present. But, the first dream that I can identify as a conscious dream,
the dream of a man, was that of my olive oil company, Genco Pura. That however
leads us away from your question, Gabriel, regarding my principle. Or, it is only the
application of my principle to myself and that’s not quite the same question. Perhaps I
should ask you, have I answered your question to your satisfaction?
Well mostly, and I’m quite grateful for as much as you have shared. But,
Don Vito, if you consider the question of principles as principles, you surely
realize that our people, dating through our struggles of the centuries all the
way back to our days as the extended empire of the Greeks, have pursued
the question of principles as principles these thousands of years. At no
point in your public story to date have your practices of reading and study
been discussed. I do not seek so much for that part of your story right now
as for, perhaps, a small bit of greater understanding about your principle of
destiny in that context.
You have lived life fully and died. You now look back on life and know what
the afterlife itself is. With all this, does your principle of destiny still hold
with the same force, and can you express it not just as a belief but as a real
principle, perhaps even as a principle that could withstand a living human’s
scientific analysis and rigor?
Ah yes, I believe I understand your question better now, Gabriel. First of all, let me
share that while I have read and studied, and continue to do so, I am anything but a
qualified or competent student. I struggle with fundamentals, basics and even a
special, counter-intuitive form of illiteracy. I have observed men, Tom Hagen was
perhaps the greatest such example, who could read and comprehend in a single
movement of mind. I have never enjoyed such a moment in my life, before or since my
death. For me, it is as if reading a language, even though I speak it perfectly, is still an
act of translation.
Sadly, this is even truer for me of numbers. It was in the art of numbers that Genco
was such a great aid to me, as well as in so many areas of life and business.
So, I have never attained what I would call “education” for myself.
The question of destiny could haunt a more intelligent man, but it does not haunt me.
No, I don’t believe I can express my principle as a principle that a scientist would
accept. Even I can observe the contradictions. What, does man have no choice? Of
course he does. What, is life predetermined? Of course it is not. These conflicts
though, thank God, do not cause me difficulty. Rather, I simply see the path of a man
and can detect if he is following the path of his one destiny or fighting it. Perhaps I
might consider expressing my principle as one of a man’s true nature, as opposed to
the controversial term “destiny.” Each man, each thing in this world surely has a
nature of its own. How can anyone argue against that? As a man chooses and acts, he
does so either in accord with his own nature or against it.
Even if a man lives and works by his nature, this does not assure he will walk a good
path. While each soul could be good, many are not.
I do not regret the path I walked so much as I regret the paths I failed to walk. I judge
my life by the omissions more so, and by far, than I judge the acts I did commit.
But perhaps more simply I may attempt to answer you, Gabriel, yes. Yes, I do believe
in the principle of destiny which I observed while I lived and nothing in the afterlife so
far has dissuaded me.
I feel that we’ve covered now, at least adequately, the moment of your
awakening as a man while you lived Don Vito. This still leaves the question
of the dream for which you lived open, though. Looking back over your
entire life, or perhaps your life up until the moment of the Sollozzo attack,
can you share what your dream was?
Yes, I believe I can and will do my best, Gabriel.
I dreamed to make my world safe, and I knew the definition of the term “my world”
very well. More than safe, though, I wished to equalize the forces so that each man
had the chance to pursue his destiny – each man, I must clarify, that was my friend. I
dreamed to be an honorable friend myself. I also dreamed to cause pain or death to
my enemies, and I do not recant that dream one bit.
A man whose writings I have struggled to study in the afterlife was one Frederic
Bastiat. He states a negative principle of law, whereby the role of government is only
to protect life, liberty and property; and equally significant in not more so, nothing
else. He teaches that law is used by some to consume the life, liberty and property of
others. This was for me anathema in life. If I could live again, perhaps I would
require Tom to teach me more of the law itself. If I were to live again perhaps I would
set my sights upon the goal attacking positive laws that empower some or even all to,
as Bastiat expresses it, plunder others legally. In fact, my other most famous principle
was that an attorney with his briefcase could steal more than 1,000 men with guns.
Never having read Bastiat when I lived, I had no idea that this principle was in 100%
accord with his work. Nor did I put the pieces together in my mind for a clear vision
that I loved rightful, minimal, negative law; or that I hated, detested and would have
loved to oppose wrongful, ever-growing, positive laws that protect evil men and their
legal plunder.
I repeat, I was not able to build such a dream. But, the dream I did live for was infused
with this spirit. I saved many a friend from legal plunder, and punished many
plunderers both legal and illegal.
Turning inward, the best way to express the dream I lived for was just one of family;
family and friends.
I truly did wish goodness for them. I wished and performed where I could, revenge
against those who hurt them. Where I could I created safety and progress for my
friends. I did not attempt to create rewards for men who did not deserve those
rewards, but I was never shy or hesitant to help any man simply for his friendship
alone, regardless of my perception of his merit along other lines. But, I was no fool,
and I knew better than to attempt to give a man more than he could absorb by the
strength of his character.
Propelling this dream of goodness for my friends and family, was a life of love that I
sought to live. Every act of force or will that I performed was performed from a heart
of love. I did not always know this, or think it consciously. But with the hindsight of
afterlife I can attest to its accuracy none-the-less.
I wished to embody love in action. In this I did have the force of will, the confidence in
myself to see that I was a leader of men. I saw myself as a better leader than one
usually finds in the world of men. I saw myself for a man of foresight and care,
responsibility and rightly won power. I believed in the powers of my mind to see
action and outcome, and where I myself found limits to my vision, I rapidly found the
minds of bright men to augment my own mind’s powers, most of all Genco and
Thomas. Well, honor must be given to Pietro and Salvatore equally. Oh, but most of
all, without a doubt, the greatest power for good in the dream I fought for in life was
Carmela my beloved.
In the love she bore for me, in her patience, in her extraordinary strength of character,
in the goodness of her heart, in the faith by which she lived, in these and in all aspects
of her being, there you may find the true roots of my dream.
A change I would make – not a huge one, but one I would make if I could go back –
would be to have lived a little more romantically with my wife. No, we did not need
too much other than we had. Yes, we loved our children and we did enjoy the small
pleasures each day brought. My wife has a great sense of humor and in life she never
took me as seriously as everyone else did, or as I took myself. She laughed at me often,
and deeply. She scorned me and my foolishness, yet did so with the love of one who
saw the goodness of my soul and the reach of my mind’s powers. She understood the
will by which I executed the thoughts of my heart, often, as wives do, far better than I
understood myself.
Yes, the best statement of my dream would have been, if I could have formulated it, to
be worthy to be Carmela’s man.
Even though I cannot claim to have known my dream consciously, I can state that I
lived by that dream to the degree that I succeeded in life. And, I can state emphatically
that I never lost Carmela’s love.
It’s tempting to linger further, Don Vito, and to focus more on the dream
that motivated you, and of which you were consciously aware. Surely, there
was the dream of Genco Pura. And, as you built your crime family – what
has come to be known as the Cosa Nostra, or the extended set of families
that made up the greater world of which you were more than just a part –
surely there were dreams you dreamed for it, all of which would be
wonderful to learn more about. But, while I hope we may return to shed
much light upon those parts of your life in future conversations, I think we
should turn now to a question of victory. A dream is a grand thing, a force
that cannot be captured into any single victory. A dream is the sum of all
the victories of a man’s life. Yet it must be expressed in specific contexts at
specific moments in time. The best term for these moments is “victory.”
That is, a single victory, while not being a dream unto itself, is still the
embodiment of the dream that motivates it.
Are there victories you won, or even some that you did not win but which
you can specifically share as expressions of the dream you lived for?
My greatest victory, outside of the marriage and our lives together as husband and
wife, was our son Michele. There is much I would change if I could, even in the way I
raised him. But, that he fulfilled my hopes in a son can be bear no doubt at all. He is
my own son in whom I am well pleased.
No, I did not give him the start in life, outside of my world with is risks and costs that I
dreamed to give him. No, I did not teach him in his youth what I should have taught
him. No, I did not feed his mind with the information and sources – such as Bastiat’s
work mentioned above – that would have been necessary for us to arrive at a better
place sooner. It saddens me when I hear him say, toward the end of the movie, “we
just didn’t have enough time, Pop; we didn’t have enough time.”
Yet Michele’s care and courage, his force and power, his brilliance and the reach of his
mind, his vision, his ability to build and execute a plan, his transformative powers
invested though they were to clean up the mess that I failed to prevent or address
myself; these and so many other aspects of his life thrilled my soul then and thrill my
soul now. To have a son like Michele is just about as much victory as any man could
ask of life
At a far earlier stage, feeding my family was a joy to me at each and every meal we
consumed. To know that Carmela did not want for food, that she could feed her
children without fear, this was a great victory. She often laughed at me in the years as
they passed due to the fact that I could never eat food without feeling the very spiritual
force in that food. She called me a peasant for this, and scorned the garden I loved so
well in my last years for this reason too. But, those were just her way of showing love.
To eat with joy is a tremendous victory in life.
I must also share a victory in which I am not proud. I am proud of my olive oil
company, itself. But, my story-teller Puzo’s interpretation of my business methods and
the thinking behind my business methods saddens me from this side of the veil. He was
completely correct in what he wrote. I was motivated as so many businessmen and
dream builders are, by dreams of total power, and, as he put it, of the “inefficiency of
competition.” That I defeated all my competitors in business, and the means by which
I did so is now, in my afterlife, a true regret.
Understand, I have no problem with my success itself, and I would never forego
the joy of victory in business. This is no mere retrospective morality, either. I now
understand what I did not in life. I now realize that the very methods of my victories
came at prices that I had no eye to or understanding of whatsoever while I lived.
When I defeated other olive oil importers, wiping out or absorbing their businesses
into my own, I bloodied myself with violence. I could have defeated many if not most
of them by simple superiority of service and quality. Those whom I could not defeat by
such means would have kept me sharp, forcing me to improve my offerings, cost
control, quality and strategy. But, instead of such a vision, I entered into the stream of
abuse and extortion that have always plagued my people. I can forgive myself for this
aspect, though. There were many other businessmen who threatened me with violence
and in many ways, it simply was the way things were done. To that extent, I have
never – then or now – felt shame to meet fire with fire. What I now believe I missed,
though, was how I too surrendered to the temptations of power without realizing that
I did. I did not exclusively constrain my violence to other violent men. No, I used all
my power against all my enemies even when they were mere competitors. This is one
of my great regrets.
Another complexity is that I do not regret breaking prohibition, at all. But we can
discuss that in detail another time.
Reaching back to the earliest defenders of our people, the original Mafiosi, their
purpose was to bring peace to us who were so horribly abused by the wealthy, the
politicians and the church in evil unison. The fact that secret organization could
impede the march of their powers was amazing. But, instantly, the Mafiosi found the
temptations of their power to be too great. As soon as they felt power in their hands,
they immediately surrendered to the temptation to serve the wealthy, the politicians
and the church in controlling the people.
In my own business victories, I did no differently. That is, as I became rich and
powerful, I used my power to serve myself without the limits it was my duty to live
within. My shame, my heart break over this will not be credible to the world. And, I
do not know, I cannot say that I would have sufficient wisdom and goodness to forego
such joys if I were given it to do all over again. Likely, I would fail again.
But, I do know what the right victory would have been. I should, instead of having
wiped out competition, built it up. I should have sought to help my competitors in
business to become ever better competitors in business. It is a strange thing, one few
can follow. In business, while you wish to win each battle against your competitor,
you do NOT wish to put your competitor out of business. Rather, you wish to inspire
him to compete at an ever-greater level. It is only in the competition he provides you
that you can find the path to your own next level of performance, of better service.
That I knew how to serve my customers, and did so in all things, is a great victory of
which I am still quite proud. But, that I never learned how to honorably serve my
competitors in business is a source of great sadness to this very day.
What many consider evil, but that I consider quite righteous, is the great joy I felt
while watching Michele exact revenge against Barzini and Tattaglia, as well as in
defeating the combined forces of all the five families against us. His victory was and is
a thing of sweetness to my soul. In fact, this is a lesson that I feel Francis Coppola
failed to convey properly. Mario places Michele’s ultimate victory in such a clear
location as the high point of our story that no intelligent reader can doubt that the hero
has won. Mario has seen that Michele reached higher than his father and covered for
the sins and failures of his father. He need not say these things as they are crystal
clear from the very structure of our story.
In my afterlife I have found a turning point that society has made, letting go of
ancient truths. The easiest place to see this is an ancient form of justice, called
Trial by Combat. No one doubted for a moment that God would only allow the
righteous to win and the evil to lose. I suspect that our Father laughed at us for
the simplicity of this faith, but I bet He loved us for it anyway. That we now can
so easily eject God from combat would be just as laughable if it were not so sad
The world though does not realize that Michele’s victory absolutely holds God’s
favor within it. I’ll explain more of the cause for the world’s misunderstanding of
this in a moment, but let me turn to a similar problem relating to Michele’s and
Kay’s marriage and the difference from the book to the film.
If you read Mario’s book you’ll see that Michele and Kay became a wonderful team in
life, quite a bit like Carmela and me. Sadly though, Michele never felt the same heat or
passion of love for Kay that he did for Apollonia. In this I completely failed him. I
should have taught him not to settle in this matter. But then, I should have helped him
protect Apollonia in the first place, which I did not. For all that, Puzo understood the
beauty and grace of Michele’s marriage to Kay in a way that Coppola either missed, or
worse, simply perverted for his and for Hollywood’s reasons.
I have not digressed, Gabriel. No, the failure to honor the marriage between Michele
and Kay is tied, quite directly, to the failure to celebrate Michele’s great victory. This is
the lesson from Michele’s great victory that the world does not seem to see, hear or
contemplate…
It can be done. You can wipe out your enemies. They can be defeated.
It does not matter what the law of the land says about such things. You do not have to
surrender your right of action to the law. The law is not always just, and to accept its
dictates as if it were is to become the slave of the wealthy, the politicians and the
church. But, my dear Francis, for all the power of his art and the beauty he has
brought into the world, for all the goodness he achieved, is in this matter a servant of
the wealthy, the politicians and the church no different than any Sicilian Mafioso of the
past or present.
The ridiculous message his film attempts to convey; the message that is expressed
unmistakably by its tone in the matter of Michele’s marriage, is that crime does not
pay. If you watch both of the early films, Part 1 & Part 2, you will see that Francis
destroys the relationship between Michele and Kay. This simply did not occur, but it is
Francis’ method of punishing Michele for crime.
The better message would be that crime comes at a cost and is never free. The silly
idea that crime does not pay is laughable in the extreme, and no intelligent mind can
accept this stupid maxim. What we see in these two films is that the Italian Mafioso
must suffer in the end. This is not but the shallow, conventional and fantasy-based
morality of Hollywood. Even this would not be so bad in its own right if the morality
tale were true. But, a false morality tale must always sacrifice not only its characters
but also the truth itself.
The truth is that Michele won. The enemies of our family were killed, as they rightly
should have been. It is this victory that allows me some peace here in the afterlife.
Hearing the force of your words, Don Vito – not to mention my own pride in
my brother Michele’s great victory – I am led to ask, would you then claim
his resolution, his word and his might as your own? Well no, I know you’d
never “take” such a thing from him, that’s not what I mean. Would you be
able to agree, Don Vito, if I proposed that his word and might were what
you had to empower if you were to hold your head in the afterlife, unable as
you were to create that victory yourself?
This is a very painful question, Gabriel.
Give me a moment…
{Don Vito must wipe some tears from his eyes at this point and he appears to
need more than just a few moments to compose himself. You can see that he
is searching to find both his answer to the question as well as his courage to
share this answer as he attempts to recompose himself to move forward.}
Before I attempt to answer, I must identify my great, great failure, the greatest of my
entire life. I dreamed no dream for Constanza.
[Don Vito must take a bit more time. In his pain he is now unable to prevent
himself from weeping. It will take him some further minutes for this to pass.
Gabriel has given him a handkerchief. Don Vito is regaining his composure
to speak, now. Here he is again…}
You know, Gabriel… I judged Amerigo Bonasera. Not horribly, not without love. But,
I did judge him and when he told me that he wept for his daughter, I failed to realize
that he wept more for himself than for her broken face or lost innocence. Our children
are stronger than we, most often, at least those that live past their moments of greatest
trial as his daughter did, and as Michele did. No, Santino and Frederico were not
stronger than me. And Constanza could never match up to her mother’s strength,
although she did survive.
Yet, when Amerigo came to me, I did not see that he wept for himself. In fact, it was
not until this very moment that I realize that he and I are completely brothers of the
soul in this. We both weep for our failures with our daughters.
Why did I not dream a dream for Constanza? I will not try to answer, at least not
today. That I failed to dream that dream is, though, something that must be explained.
When she came to me, with her heart aflutter and her romance upon her sleeve, I tried
– the claim of all weak men – I tried to dissuade her. That I was displeased she
certainly knew and Puzo reports this simply and rightly. But how, of all moments in
my life of strength, could I merely try and thereby fail my daughter?
Perhaps I must declare that my sin was that of silence most of all. I failed to speak. I
failed to speak boldly as I ought to have spoken. I did not explain this evil world to my
daughter. I did not believe in her mind or her heart’s powers to face the truth. In my
patriarchal arrogance I assumed that my disapproving silence should be enough.
That my disapproval was not enough, that I even organized and paid for the wedding,
that I invited all my friends and accepted all their gifts, and held the wedding in my
family’s home; that I did all this never stirred the better mind within that knew I was
failing her utterly.
I will not weep again, but will speak through my tears. I gave the life of my daughter
away to an evil man, and in so doing I signed the death certificate of my oldest son.
Many, when they read this, will seek to defend me on the basis of my love. No such
defense must be accepted and I will not. The very love in my heart obligated me to do
the right thing in that moment, in that moment above and beyond all other moments.
This is my worst, most unforgivable failure.
No, I did not die when Sollozzo’s men shot me. And I did not die when Santino was
massacred. And I did not die while Michele was in Sicilia, although his beautiful,
innocent young bride did. Her life too, rests on my shoulders due to my failure to
dream a dream for Constanza.
Not dying, I did not rise with my whole self ever again either. While I still lived, I did
harden myself to see my failure; and to realize that it must be corrected. Yes, I attack
myself for surrendering that responsibility to Michele. Even there, though, it would
have been more than I could have performed to both save Michele in that moment and
summon the force of soul to address the enemies of our family, without and within, as
they had to be addressed. So, I do not judge myself so heavily for that, for what that’s
worth.
Yet I claim that in hardening my soul to the degree I did, I did prepare Michele. That I
did do.
No, of course I would never in all the years of infinity take one shred of Michele’s credit
as you know Gabriel and as you said. But yes, your question is exactly right. My
great victory, to the degree such a needless thing can be a victory, is in the safety that
Michele won so soon after I died. Yes, in his resolution, word and might I do hold my
own honor, to some degree, indeed
But, let me ask for you, Gabriel, what resolution, word and might should I have had;
what act, had I executed it, would have spared Michele from the path that resulted
from my failure? No, don’t answer. I will.
The answer is that I should have dreamed a dream for Constanza
Go there with me, Gabriel. I could and should have explained to her that she was
wrong in giving her love to Carlo. Even if she had insisted on marrying him against
my wishes and without my blessing, then I could and should have stepped away and
allowed her to travel on in life with him, but without my blessing. That would have
meant that I would not have paid for the wedding. It would also have meant that she
could never fool herself into thinking the life I gave her was given by him. More
important still, she would have felt the presence of my dream for her even as she tried
to escape. And most important of all, if I had dreamed my dream for her, I would have
played my part rightly and never have opened our family to Carlo’s treachery or
Santino’s resulting death. No, I did not need to dream Constanza’s dream to keep
Santino safe. A man must dream each child’s dream for that child alone. But, if I had
dreamed that dream Santino would not have died the death he died. You must see this
for my daughter. My dream would have protected Constanza from the burden of
Santino’s death as well.
No, I don’t judge myself so much for the foolish Italian value of non-intervention that
Mario reports. Even at its most foolish, respect is never a 100% unjustifiable thing.
Having paid for the wedding, it was on me by the values of my people to prevent
myself from interfering. But, if I had dreamed the dream I should have dreamed for
Constanza, none of that would have occurred. Rather, no matter the pain or the
difficulty, Constanza would have eventually felt and come, somehow, to understand
my dream and its respect for her as a person, as a soul, as a force in the world, as a
member of our family, as my daughter. It’s not that my love was not enough, it was.
It was my respect that failed, and that I failed to dream her dream as I was supposed
to dream it.
{Gabriel is deeply moved by his father’s painful answer and terrible emotion.
He waits, patiently, until he sees that it is time to wrap up.}
Don Vito, I had three other questions prepared, but I’ve decided to forego
them for now. Allow me to contemplate all you have shared and we can
recommence another day.
No, I will not thank you for what you have shared, as my gratitude can only
be a meager thing in the face of your pain. But, I can and must honor you
and give you my blessing right now. No, you were not without failure, not
without great failure in your life. I suspect that the nature of your business
failure is even more important than we have identified and that in future
conversation we will discover that there is much there to be unearthed.
But, no man can possibly disagree intelligently with your judgment that you
failed to dream a dream for Connie. If I could, I would forgive you for this.
Fortunately, I know that Connie has, as has Michael and Sonny. But, the
world does not yet know of your sin in this, Don Vito.
So, we must do our part to publish this truth as widely and broadly as we
are able. As you know, of course, we are dependent upon your Godson
Pasquale for his ability to broadcast our words. Something tells me,
though, that the force of your own truth will help make his job not so very
difficult.
In this, allow me then to assert this principle as a principle, Don Vito.
A man must dream the dream of his children’s lives. He must dream for
his family as a whole, of course. More so, though, he must dream the right
dream, the best dream he can dream for each child be he masculine or be
she a feminine child.
The other commandments of The Switch must each be faced, surrendered
to and to what degree possible, mastered. But it all begins with a dream.
Thus, we must conclude for today that each man, each father, must not
allow his soul to rest while life is in his body until he has dreamed the
dream he owes them for his children, for each child.