Greatness through Character and Toil
an interview with Alfred Pisani
by John Portelli
Narratives and interviews with particularly successful persons have a tendency to become
diffused with an aura of wonder and amazement. Psychoanalysts have described our
propensity to ascribe and project such attitudes first onto our parents, and eventually to
persons whom we tend to see as role models within our world. Carl Gustav Jung, for example,
described archetypes as being internal, innate models which we tend to seek around us.
One of the most important archetypes described by Jung is that of the Hero who in our eyes
we see as possessing the qualities of invulnerability, strength, competence and courage.
In interviewing Alfred Pisani there is a significant risk in projecting the Hero archetype
onto his story, however in many ways this would do a disservice both to the narrative and
to the person as we would fail to recognise the largely humane challenges that went into
developing a worldwide hotel chain; Corinthia Group, as well as the strong character and
hard work that went into achieving this. In our recent meeting, Alfred Pisani was willing
to go through his life story and in many ways this turned out to be a narrative featuring a
strong character but also a lot of hard work and toil.
HOSPITALITY MALTA
Issue 03
23