Imagery

Imagery

Primarily through metaphoric comparison and the inclusion of specific detail, Puzo illustrates major settings in the novel. Though his tone is dry and often cynical, Puzo has an ability to manipulate language and inspire vivid images of characters and scenery. He describes the home of the Hollywood producer, Jack Woltz, in saying that it “looked like an implausible movie set. There was a plantation-type mansion, huge grounds girdled by a rich black-dirt bridle path, stables and a pasture for a herd of horses. The hedges, flower beds and grasses were as carefully manicured as a movie star’s nails.” (59) Thus, the reader is able to visualize the setting, further enhancing the power of Puzo’s language.

Puzo is also able to establish a mood through imagery. With a dark and haunting tone he describes a meeting at a nightclub after its closing. About the bar he says, “the doorman was no longer there when [Luca Brasi] went in. The hatcheck girl was gone. Only Bruno Tattaglia waited to greet him and lead him to the deserted bar at the side of the room. Before him he could see the desert of small tables with the polished yellow wood dance floor gleaming like a small diamond in the middle of them. In the shadows was the empty bandstand, out of it grew the skeleton metal stalk of a microphone.” (109-110) The mood that he creates is threatening and negative. His eerie depiction only hints at the events about to take place; in this way, Puzo’s imagery gains the dual ability also to foreshadow.