Mario Puzo, The godfather (crime novel)

 Mario Puzo, The godfather (crime novel) 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Godfather_(novel)

Balzac's original text: "The secret of a great success for which you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found out because it was properly executed."

Literary references

The Corleone family closely resembles the Karamazov family in The Brothers Karamazov: a powerful father, an impulsive oldest son, a philosophical son, a sweet-tempered son, and an adopted stepson who is maintained as an employee. Honoré de Balzac's novel Le Père Goriot (1835) has been the inspiration for notable lines that have gained wide popularity in cinema history. Similarly, Puzo opened his 1969 novel with an epigraph popularly attributed to Balzac: "Behind every great fortune there is a crime." The saying is most likely evolved over time from Balzac's original text: "The secret of a great success for which you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found out because it was properly executed."[5]

"I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse" was included in both the original Puzo novel and in the film adaptation. It is the second-ranking cinematic quote included in AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes (2005) by the American Film Institute. Its origin may be from the same work to which Balzac is credited with the opening epigraph. Balzac wrote of Vautrin telling Eugene: "In that case, I will make you an offer that no one would decline."[6] 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honor%C3%A9_de_Balzac

http://www.jgeoff.com/godfather/novel/gfnovel.html

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/09/09/fortune-crime/

Question for Quote Investigator: The popular 1969 novel “The Godfather” by Mario Puzo recounted the violent tale of a Mafia family, and the epigraph selected by the author was fascinating:

Behind every great fortune there is a crime.

—Balzac

While searching I found a few different versions of this saying. Yet, I have been unable to locate this maxim in a work written by Honoré de Balzac:

Behind every great fortune lies a great crime

Every great fortune begins with a crime

At the root of every great fortune there was a crime.

Should Balzac really be credited with this saying?

Reply from Quote Investigator: QI believes that this adage was inspired by a sentence that was written by Honoré de Balzac, but the expression has been simplified in an evolutionary process. Here is the original in French from a serialization of “Le Père Goriot” published in “Revue de Paris” in 1834:1

Le secret des grandes fortunes sans cause apparente est un crime oublié, parce qu’il a été proprement fait.

Balzac published a series of interlinked novels called “La Comédie Humaine” or “The Human Comedy”, and “Le Père Goriot” was part of this series. Eventually all were translated into English, and here is a rendering of the statement above published in 1896:2

The secret of a great success for which you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found out, because it was properly executed.

Here is another translation into English that was published in 1900:3

The secret of a great fortune made without apparent cause is soon forgotten, if the crime is committed in a respectable way.

Note that Honoré de Balzac did not pronounce a general rule that larceny was at the root of all large fortunes. However, the simplified statement that is popular in modern times is arguably more provocative and consequently more memorable.

The simplification process is illustrated by an instance of the saying printed in a periodical in 1912. The following words were credited to an unidentified “French writer”. QI hypothesizes that they were inspired by a schematic memory of Balzac’s words:4

At the base of every great fortune there is a great crime.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/09/09/fortune-crime/

https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780191843730.001.0001/q-oro-ed5-00000746

Le secret des grandes fortunes sans cause apparente est un crime oublié, parce qu'il a été proprement fait.

The secret of a great success for which you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found out, because it was properly executed.

often quoted as ‘Behind every great fortune lies a great crime’

Le Père Goriot (1835)

https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780191843730.001.0001/q-oro-ed5-00000746

https://todayinsci.com/B/Balzac_Honore/BalzacHonore-Quotations.htm

bing translator

Le secret des grandes fortunes sans cause apparente est un crime oublié, parce qu’il a été proprement fait.

The secrecy of great fortunes without apparent cause is a forgotten crime, because it has been properly done.