It is 1876. As Cornelius Vanderbilt lies close to death in his lavish New York townhouse, there's an almost carnival-like atmosphere outside as the reporters who made him a household name gather to wait for the end. But in the last of a lifetime of surprises, cantankerous old Vanderbilt unexpectedly allows one of the journalists inside. He's tired of the lies. He intends to make sure his story is told, the true story of how a dirt-poor farm kid from Staten Island grew up to be one of America's first tycoons: admired by the public, consulted by Presidents, feared by his business rivals and, for the most part, unloved by the eleven children he treated with impatience. At first the reporter is only interested in the core of the story, how a boy groomed by an illiterate father in a family that has been plagued by poverty and misfortune, could end up the richest man in the world. How did that happen? "My readers want to know", he tells the crusty old man. "What's your secret?" Was it shrewdness? Ferocious ambition? The incredible force of his will? Vanderbilt tells his story with the clarity that comes from looking back. It is as if it had all been preordained by Vanderbilt's vision. He was a man possessed. He described himself as crazy on the subject of money. He thought of little else every day, morning, noon and night. How to make money drove all of his decisions, led him wherever that question pointed. Soon, however, another dynamic emerges. The reporter realizes he's on to the biggest scoop of his career. Vanderbilt's original intention may have been a final effort to shape his legacy, but as he moves closer to death he tosses away all inhibitions. Memories pour out of him. He's trying to get a handle on them, make sense of it all. He is half way to hell. He has stopped sleeping. Nightmares startle him awake. They're always about the same thing, his father coming to kill him Drawing on his wealth of experience as a psychiatrist, observing the complex streams running through the human psyche, which can thrive under unimaginable adversity, Simon Sobo paints a fascinating portrait of the powerful driven man who called himself Commodore.
About the Author: Simon Sobo has excited the praise of a wide variety of writers, Anna Freud, Pauline Kael, Scott Peck, and Lauren Slater for his astute, non-fiction, literary and psychiatric articles. Amongst others his writing has appeared in Yale Review, Psychoanalytic Study of the Child. Psychiatric Times, Medical Hypothesis, as well as chapters in anthologies such as ADHD Revisited. He is also author of The Fear of Death, a conversation with Freud. He has always been drawn to a good story, particularly fascinated by people with soaring hopes and the drive to see them fulfilled. So when the compelling facts of Cornelius Vanderbilt's life, his pathetic beginnings and extraordinary triumphs, grabbed his attention, Commodore was half written. Who can resist a super hero? They address what we are lacking, provide us with triumph and power--at least while the movie plays. The Commodore would quickly interrupt if he were around. "I ain't no hero." And most certainly he wasn't, but if one goes to Grand Central Station on Vanderbilt Avenue in New York, and yields to the spirit of the place, Vanderbilt's final big project, his magnificent castle in his hometown, dedicated to his true love, business and enterprise, one might not see a superhero, but certainly this man had an awfully long and good run. He was the Michael Jordan of his day. He did not know how to quit. He refused to not win. People couldn't get enough of him in the newspapers One of their own showed 'em it can get done. One of 'em that spit and cursed and wouldn't take nothing from no one. And managed to keep it going and going. The difference between him and a sports here is that he kept it going well into his eighties. The American dream may be a cliche, but to them that lived it, to the millions who came on a boat with little but the clothes they could carry, Vanderbilt's story is what brought them here. He was their hero in the land of opportunity. A superhero (with the blemishes of a real person). Sobo feels he should have been writing fiction all along. Vanderbilt allowed him a voice that he didn't know existed. Approaching 70 Sobo is now convinced that there will be many more to come.