Disney has pretty much figured out what makes a fairy tale worth turning into a full-length feature film: it needs to have a likable protagonist, a worthy struggle for said protagonist, and, of course, a happily ever after ending. Godfather Death does not have any of those things. Its main character is self-serving; his struggle is to advance himself in society; and (spoiler alert) he dies in the end. It’s not exactly Disney material.
In fact, it’s not exactly a fairy tale either. Godfather Death is actually an anti-fairy tale, meaning it pivots around the punishments of succumbing to vice instead of the rewards of pursuing virtue. As such, they were traditionally told to warn children and even scare them from going astray.
Though Godfather Death doesn’t fit into the Disney paradigm, it works extremely well in a classical classroom. Not only does it give insight into the medieval mindset, but it also poses many powerful questions about justice, truth, and equality that can still be applied today. Plus, it makes for great classroom dramatizations. Let’s take a look at the plot first and then address some of those larger issues.
PLOT SUMMARY
Exposition – Background
At the outset of the story, we learn that a thirteenth child has been born to a very poor family.
Inciting Incident – The Problem
As if having another mouth to feed wasn’t problem enough for the parents, they are also at a loss over whom to name as their son’s Godfather.
Rising Action – The Build-up
Unlike many a parent today who might make a short list of candidates to be vetted, the father simply decides to choose the first person he meets on the street. It’s not that the father is reckless but that he’s desperate. After all, he probably tapped all of his connections on his first twelve kids.
As luck would have it, the father meets God Himself! We might expect that to be the end of story with the son being blessed to live happily ever after, but the father foolishly turns God down saying, ”Thou givest to the rich, and leavest the poor to hunger.”
No sooner does God leave, then the Devil offers to be the son’s Godfather. The father turns him down as well saying, “Thou deceivest men and leadest them astray.”
Finally, Death offers himself as the Godfather and even promises riches for the child. The father replies, “Thou art the right one; thou takest from the rich as well as the poor, without distinction; thou shalt be godfather.”
Death then takes the boy into his special guardianship and mentors him to become a doctor, but not an ordinary doctor with ordinary medicine. Instead, Death shows his Godson a special plant that can be used to heal the sick. The one caveat is that Death will always dictate who gets the medicine. It is up to him who will get to be saved and who must die.
Death says, “If I stand by the head of the sick man, thou mayst say with confidence that thou wilt make him well again, and if thou givest him of this herb he will recover; but if I stand by the patient’s feet, he is mine, and thou must say that all remedies are in vain, and that no physician in the world could save him.”
Climax – The Breaking Point
Their partnership thrives for a long time, and the Godson becomes rich and famous. Then he foolishly decides to “cheat” death by saving someone Death wants to claim. Death warns the Godson not to do it again, but the Godson can’t resist the urge to save a princess on her deathbed, for whoever does so is promised her hand in marriage.
Falling Action – The Unraveling
Though Death lets the princess live, he declares that he must have the Godson’s life in her place.
Resolution – Not So Happily Ever After
True to his word, Death takes his Godson into a deep cave below the earth. The cave is full of candles, each representing someone’s life. The Godson realizes that his candle is just about to go out and begs Death to light him a new one. Death acts like he is going to but then cruelly stomps his Godson’s candle out.
A LESSON ON VIRTUES
The Middle Ages was full of poor, big families like the one in Godfather Death. When we realize just how desperate their plight often was, it is hard not to sympathize with the father in the story. He wants to provide for his family but can’t. What’s more, he has grown bitter about his lot in life, and he quite literally turns his back on God. This causes him to have a distorted view of the meaning of justice, truth, and equality. He displays his misunderstanding of each of these virtues in turn when he meets the prospective Godparents.
His interaction with God revolves around justice, or the state of getting what one deserves. No doubt the father felt he deserved better in life. Let’s assume he is a hard-worker as many fathers in the Middle Ages must have been. Yet, he clearly has not gotten what he thinks he deserves for his efforts. Instead, his life is full of hardship, and he blames God.
His interaction with the Devil focuses on truth, which is seeing things for what they are. The father knows the Devil is a liar and does not want that for his son. Yet, although he turns the Devil down and tries to walk away from his lies, the father has actually already figuratively embraced the Devil’s lies in that he believes God unjust, which is not true.
The father is so confused that he ends up believing Death a true representative of equality. After all, doesn’t everybody die, whether rich or poor, good or bad? In that simplistic sense, Death does indeed appear the great equalizer.
But equality is not just about making everything the same in a quantifiable way. It’s much more fundamentally about recognizing the equality of everyone based on their dignity as a child of God. Put differently, equality is derived from the love God has for us. Paradoxically, the more we lessen ourselves through humility and obedience, the greater our love is returned to God.
RAGS TO RICHES AND BACK AGAIN
Like Cinderella, this story has a “rags to riches” motif, but the eventual wealth and fame of the Godson is neither to his credit nor is it lasting. Instead, it was born out of making a deal of sorts with Death. True, his dad made it on his behalf in the first place, but the Godson is complicit nonetheless in that he goes along with it as he grows.
If we look at this from the Godson’s perspective, we might say that he was “trapped” by his family just as many children in the Middle Ages must have felt. If the father was poor, so too would be the son. While the Godson in this story escapes his father’s poverty, he does not escape his father’s distorted view of the world.
Like him, the Godson does not understand the meaning of justice, truth, and equality. He thinks he deserves his wealth and yet is willing to lie to attain it. What’s more, he wants Death to treat him differently than others simply because he is his Godson. Such exceptions would have been the very thing his birth father would have deplored.
As my students heartily agree, the Godson gets what he deserves in the end. While none seem to like that he dies, it is a fitting sort of justice. With Death as a Godfather, he should not have expected life.
CONCLUSION
After discussing this story with my students, they tend to agree that anti-fairy tales, complete with all their grim details and unhappy endings, are good for kids to read. It shows them—albeit in an exaggerated way—what could happen if they make bad choices.
Sure, it might be a bit dark, but it becomes less so when we tease out the themes and look at what they are trying to shed light on. Even a very young child would be quick to realize that everything went wrong in Godfather Death when the father turned his back on God. And hopefully, that same child would learn from the mistakes in the story and embrace God instead, especially in difficult times.