Quotes from Mario Puzo

I was young myself once, and believe me, in love the truth is of no importance.

The man who plays alone never loses.' " Guiliano

Do not exercise power because it is easy to your hand. And do not get carried away with a certainty of victory when your intellect tells you there is even a hint of tragedy.

Walter Kaylin was great! He was outrageous, he just carried it off. He'd have this one guy killing a thousand other guys. Then they beat him into the ground, you think he's dead, but he rises up again and kills another thousand guys.

The meeting would be safe as a wedding.

Nekad neuztraucies par naudu. Dom? par slavu.

Le haré una oferta que no podrá rechazar.

This country has been good to me.

I'll tell you one thing you didn't learn from him: talking the way you're talking now. There are things that have to be done and you do them and you never talk about them. You don't try to justify them. They can't be justified. You just do them. Then you forget it.

Friendship is more than talent. It is more than government. It is almost the equal of family. Never forget that.

Softly, reassuringly, he comforted his friend, as they waited for death together. As if the Don could truly snatch the life of Genco Abbandando back from that most foul and criminal traitor to man.

Fari vagnari a pizzu." Pizzu means the beak of any small bird such as a canary.

It pleased him to see the hurt look on her face, the tears springing into her eyes. She might be a daughter of the Great Don but she was his wife, she was his property now and he could treat her as he pleased. It made him feel powerful that one of the Corleones was his doormat.

Anybody. She uses her body like I use the loose

But della Rovere frowned and said, Heed my warning, Guido Feltra. He's full of the devil, this son of the church.

Pope Alexander smiled. He seemed more amused with the story than horrified. The Baglioni are true believers, he said. They believe in paradise. Such a great gift. How otherwise can man bear this moral life? Unfortunately, such a belief also gives evil men the courage to commit great crimes in the name of good and God.

He said to the cardinal, I'm a peasant, not instructed in the ways of heaven. But I have never broken my word. And you, a Cardinal of the Catholic Church, with all your holy garments and crosses of Jesus, lied to me like a heathen Moor. Your sacred office alone will not save your life.

Mercy is a vice, a pretension to powers we do not have. Those who give mercy commit an unpardonable offense to the victim. And that is not our duty here on earth.

Un hombre que no pasa el suficiente tiempo con su familia no merece ser llamado hombre.

Don Vito Corleone was a man to whom everybody came for help, and never were they disappointed. He made no empty promises, nor the craven excuse that his hands were tied by more powerful forces in the world than himself.

Again it was like the English he so much admired, those people who could be so subtly rude that you basked in their insults for days before you realized they had mortally wounded you.

The Don knew that love is not a reliable emotion to matter how deep. Love does not ensure gratitude, does not ensure obedience, does not provide harmony in so difficult a world. No one understood this better than Don Clericuzio.

Ah, we love where we are born, we Sicilians, but Sicily does not love us.

los amigos siempre debían subestimar las virtudes de uno, mientras que los enemigos debían sobrevalorar los defectos.