THE PHENOMENON **PELE**

TIME **100**

in a game six times, four goals 30 times and three goals 90 times. And he did so not aloofly or disdainfully—as do many modern stars—but with an infectious joy that caused even the teams over which he triumphed to share in his pleasure, for it is no disgrace to be defeated by a phenomenon defying emulation.

He was born across the mountains from the great coastal cities of Brazil, in the impoverished town of Tres Corações. Nicknamed

Dico by his family, he was called Pelé by soccer friends, a word whose origins escape him. Dico shined shoes until he was discovered at the age of 11 by one of the country's premier players, Waldemar de Brito. Four years later, De Brito brought Pelé to São Paulo and declared to the disbelieving directors of the professional team in Santos, "This boy will be the greatest soccer player in the world." He was quickly leg-

end. By the next season, he was the top scorer in his league. As the *Times* of London would later say, "How do you spell Pelé? G-O-D." He has been known to stop war: both sides in Nigeria's civil war called a 48-hour cease-fire in 1967 so Pelé could play an exhibition match in the capital of Lagos.

To understand Pelé's role in soccer, some discussion of the nature of the game is necessary. No team sport evokes the same sort of primal, universal passion as soccer. During the World Cup, the matches of the national football teams

impose television schedules on the rhythm of life. Last year I attended a dinner for leading members of the British establishment and distinguished guests from all over the world

at the staid Spencer House in London. The hosts had the bad luck to have chosen the night of the match between England and Argentina—always a blood feud, compounded on this occasion by the memory of the Falklands crisis. The impeccable audience (or at least enough of it to influence the hosts) insisted that television sets be set up at strategic locations, during both the reception and the dinner. The match went into overtime and required a penalty shoot-out afterward, so the main speaker did not get to deliver his message until 11 p.m. And since England lost, the audience was not precisely in a mood for anything but mourning.

When France finally won the World Cup, Paris was paralyzed with joy for nearly 48 hours, Brazil by dejection for a similar period of time. I was in Brazil in 1962 when the national team won the World Cup in Chile. Everything stopped for two days while Rio celebrated a premature carnival.

There is no comparable phenomenon in the U.S. Our fans do not identify with their teams in such a way partly because American team sports are more cerebral and require a degree of skill that is beyond the reach of the layman.

Baseball, for instance, requires a bundle of disparate skills: hitting a ball thrown at 90 m.p.h., catching a ball flying at the speed of a bullet, and throwing long distances with great accuracy. Football requires a different set of skills for each of its 11 positions. The U.S. spectator thus finds himself viewing two discrete events: what is actually taking place on the playing field and the translation of it

**BORN** Oct. 23, 1940, in Tres Corações, in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais

**1956** Begins pro career with Santos Football Club, which wins nine championships between 1958 and 1969

**1958** In his first World Cup appearance, leads Brazil to victory

**1970** Plays his final World Cup, a victory for Brazil

**1974** Signals retirement by picking up the ball 20 minutes into final game and kneeling in midfield

**1975** In financial trouble, comes out of retirement to play for New York Cosmos

**1977** Retires from Cosmos

**1994** Long at odds with the world soccer authority, he is named Brazil's Minister of Sports

PELE WORRIED HE WAS TOO LIGHT, BUT HIS TEAM SAID, "WE'LL FEED YOU, SON"

MANCHESTE

TIM CONSIDINE

PELE AND HIS CHILDREN KELLY CHRISTINA AND EDINHO IN 1975

TIME 100

THE PHENOMENON PELE

PETER ROBINSON—EMPICS LTD

THE FIRST GOAL IN HIS LAST WORLD CUP: PELE CELEBRATES AS HE SCORES AGAINST ITALY IN THE FINALS OF THE 1970 CHAMPIONSHIP

into detailed and minute statistics. He wants his team to win, but he is also committed to the statistical triumph of the star he admires. The American sports hero is like Joe DiMaggio—a kind of Lone Ranger who walks in solitude beyond the reach of common experience, lifting us beyond ourselves.

Soccer is an altogether different sort of game. All 11 players must possess the same type of skills—especially in modern soccer, where the distinction between offensive and defensive players has dissolved. Being continuous, the game does not lend itself to being broken down into a series of component plays that, as in football or baseball, can be practiced. Baseball and football thrill by the perfection of their repetitions, soccer by the improvisation of solutions to ever changing strategic necessities. Soccer requires little equipment, other than a pair of shoes. Everybody believes he can play soccer. And it can

be played by any number of players as a pickup game. Thus soccer outside North America is truly a game for the masses, which can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. Baseball and football are an exaltation of the human experience; soccer is its incarnation.

Pelé is therefore a different phenomenon from the baseball or football star. Soccer stars are dependent on their teams even while transcending them. To achieve mythic status as a soccer player is especially difficult because the peak performance is generally quite short—only the fewest players perform at the top of their game for more than five years. Incredibly, Pelé performed at the highest level for 18 years, scoring 52 goals in 1973, his 17th year. Contemporary soccer superstars never

reach even 50 goals a season. For Pelé, who had thrice scored more than 100 goals a year, it signaled retirement.

The mythic status of Pelé derives as well from the way he incarnated the character of Brazil's national team. Its style affirms that virtue without joy is a contradiction in terms. Its players are the most acrobatic, if not always the most proficient. Brazilian teams play with a contagious exuberance. When those yellow shirts go on the attack—which is most of the time—and their fans cheer to the intoxicating beat ofamba bands, soccer becomes a ritual of fluidity and grace. In Pelé's day, the Brazilians epitomized soccer as fantasy.

I saw Pelé at his peak only once, at the final of the World Cup in 1970. Brazil's opponent was Italy, which played its tough defense coupled with

sudden thrusts to tie the game 1-1, demoralizing the Brazilians. Italy could very easily have massed its defense even more, until its frantic opponent began making the mistakes that would encompass its ruin. But, led by Pelé, Brazil paid no attention. Attacking as if the Italians were a practice team, the Brazilians ran them into the ground, 4-1.

I saw Pelé a few times afterward, when he was playing for the New York Cosmos. He was no longer as fast, but he was as exuberant as ever. By then, Pelé had become an institution. Most modern fans never saw him play, yet they somehow feel he is part of their lives. He made the transition from superstar to mythic figure. ■

> I was screaming Gooooaaaaalllll!!!!... running and jumping in the air with a release of unbearable tension.

PELE, on winning his first World Cup in 1958

Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of State, was instrumental in bringing World Cup soccer to the U.S. in 1994

TIN 1000

PELE'S MOM IS LUCIANETT
LET HIM TURN PRO, SAYING
DON'T WANT TO USE WIND
BOOTS FOR A LIVING

POPPERMOTO

THE PHENOMENON

PELE

He dominated soccer for two
decades with a passion
matched only by that of his
fans throughout the world

By HENRY KISSINGER

Heroes walk alone, but they become myths when they ennoble the lives and touch the hearts of all of us. For those who love soccer, Edson Arantes do Nascimento, generally known as Pelé, is a hero.

Performance at a high lev-
el in any sport is to exceed the
ordinary human scale. But
Pelé's performance transcend-
ed that of the ordinary star by
as much as the star exceeds

ordinary performance. He
scored an average of a goal in
every international game he
played—the equivalent of a
baseball player's hitting a
home run in every World Se-
ries game over 15 years. Be-
tween 1956 and 1974, Pelé
scored a total of 1,220 goals—
not unlike hitting an average
of 70 home runs every year
for a decade and a half.

While he played, Brazil
won the World Cup, staged
quadrennially, three times in
12 years. He scored five goals

THE STAR IN
1963: "IF PELE
HAD NOT
BEEN BORN A
MAN," WROTE
A BRAZILIAN
JOURNALIST,
"HE WOULD
HAVE BEEN A
BALL"

HULTON GETTY

110

WIL UU

PELE'S MOM, ELUG DÁVAREY, LET HIM TURN PRO. SAYING, 'DON'T START YOU SEWING BOOTS FOR A LIVING.'

POPPERMOTO

## THE PHENOMENON

# PELE

By HENRY KISSINGER

Performance at a high level in any sport is to exceed the ordinary human scale. But Pelé's performance transcended that of the ordinary star by as much as the star exceeds

ordinary performance. He scored an average of a goal in every international game he played—the equivalent of a baseball player's hitting a home run in every World Series game over 15 years. Between 1956 and 1974, Pelé scored a total of 1,220 goals— not unlike hitting an average of 70 home runs every year for a decade and a half.

HULTON GETTY

110

WIL UU

PELE'S MOM, ELUG DANTIS, LET HIM TURN PRO. SAYING, "I DON'T WANT YOUR SEATING BOOTS FOR A LIVING."

POPPERMOTO

## THE PHENOMENON

# PELE

By HENRY KISSINGER

HULTON GETTY

110

THE PHENOMENON

100
BET

There is no comparable phenomenon in the U.S. Our fans do not identify with their teams in such a way partly because American team sports are more cerebral and require a degree of skill that is beyond the reach of the layman. Base-

MANCHETE

TIM CONSIDINE

**1977** Retires from Cosmos

115

THE 100

THE PHENOMENON

PETER ROBINSON—EMPICS LTD.

77

I was screaming *Gooooaaaaaalllll!!!!...* running and jumping in the air with a release of unbearable tension.

116

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FAX NO.

P. 02

1 Heroes walk alone,
2 but they become
3 myths when they
4 ennoble the lives
5 and touch the
6 hearts of all of us.
7 For those who love
8 soccer, Edson Arantes do
9 Nascimento, generally known
10 as Pelé, is a hero.
11 Performance at a high level
12 in any sport is to exceed the ordinary human scale. But Pelé's
13 performance transcended that
14 of the ordinary star by as much
15 as the star exceeds ordinary
16
17 performance. He scored an average of a goal in every international game he played—the
18 equivalent of a baseball player's
19 hitting a home run in every
20 World Series game over 15
21 years. Between 1956 and 1974,
22 Pelé scored a total of 1,220
23 goals—not unlike hitting an average of 70 home runs every
24 year for a decade and a half. In
25 the 1966 World Cup, he scored
26 on a penalty kick from 40 yds.
27 out—the equivalent of a 600-ft.
28 home run.
29
30
31
32 While he played, Brazil

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33 won three world championships in 12 years. He scored
34 goals in a game six times,
35 four goals 30 times and three
games 90 times. And he did so
37 not aloofly or disdainfully—as
do many modern stars—but
40 with an infectious joy that
41 caused even the teams over
42 which he triumphed to share
43 in his pleasure; for it is no dis-
grace to be defeated by a phenomenon defying emulation.

46 He was born across the
mountains from the great
47 coastal cities of Brazil, in the
impoverished town of Tres
50 Corações. Nicknamed "Dico"
51 by his family, he was called
52 "Pelé" by soccer friends, a
word whose origins escape
him. Dico shined shoes until he
54 was discovered at the age of 11
55 by one of the country's premier
56 players Waldemar de Brito.
58 Four years later, de Brito
brought Pelé to São Paulo and
60 declared to the disbelieving directors of the Santos team:
"This boy will be the greatest
62 soccer player in the world."
64 He was quickly legend. By the

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65 next season, he was the top

66 scorer in his league.

67 As the Times of Lon-

68 don would later say:

69 "How do you spell

70 Pelé? G-O-D." He

71 has been known to

72 stop war: both sides

73 in Nigeria's civil war

74 called a 48-hour

75 ceasefire in 1967 so

76 Pelé could play an ex-

77 hibition match in the

78 capital of Lagos.

79 To understand

80 Pelé's role in soccer,

81 some discussion of

82 the nature of the

83 game is necessary. No

84 team sport evokes the

85 same sort of primal,

86 universal passion as

87 soccer. During the

88 quadrennial World

89 Cups, the matches of

90 the national football

91 teams impose the

92 television schedule

93 on the rhythm of life. Last year

94 I attended a dinner for leading

95 members of the British estab-

96 lishment and distinguished

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97 guests from all over the world

98 at the staid Spencer House in

99 London. The hosts had the bad

100 luck to have chosen the night of

101 the match between England

102 and Argentina—always a blood

103 feud, compounded on this oc-

104 casion by the memory of the

105 Falklands crisis. The impeccable audience (or at least

106 enough of it to influence the

107 host) insisted that television

108 sets be set up at strategic loca-

109 tions, both during the recep-

110 tion and the dinner. The match

111 went into overtime and re-

112 required a penalty shoot-out af-

113 terward, so the main speaker

114 did not get to deliver his mes-

115 sage until 11 p.m. And since

116 England lost, the audience was

117 not precisely in a mood for any-

118 thing but mourning.

119 When France finally won

120 the World Cup, Paris was para-

121 lyzed with joy for nearly 48

122 hours; Brazil, by dejection for a

123 similar period of time. I was in

124 Brazil in 1962 when the nation-

125 al team won the World Cup in

126 Chile. Everything stopped for

127 two days while Rio celebrated a

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[LC]

129 premature carnival.

130 There is no comparable

131 phenomenon in the U.S. Our

132 fans do not identify with their

133 teams in such a way partly be-

134 cause American team sports

135 are more cerebral and require

136 a degree of skill that is beyond

137 the reach of the layman. Base-

138 ball, for instance, requires a

139 bundle of disparate skills: hit-

140 ting a ball thrown at 90 m.p.h.,

141 catching balls flying at the

142 speed of bullets and throwing

143 long distances with great accu-

144 racy. Football requires a differ-

145 ent set of skills for each of its 11

146 positions. The U.S. spectator

147 thus finds himself viewing two

148 discrete events: what is actually

149 taking place on the playing

150 field, and the translation of it

151 into detailed and minute statis-

152 tics. He wants his team to win,

153 but he is also committed to the

154 statistical triumph of the star he

155 admires. American sports he-

156 roes are like Joe DiMaggio—a

157 kind of Lone Ranger who

158 walks in solitude beyond the

159 reach of common experience,

160 lifting us beyond ourselves.

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161 Soccer is an altogether different sort of game. All 11 players must possess the same type of skills—especially in modern soccer, where the distinction between offensive and defensive players has dissolved. Being continuous, the game does not lend itself to being broken down into a series of component plays that, as in football or baseball, can be practiced. Baseball and football thrill by the perfection of their repetitions; soccer, by the improvisation of solutions to ever changing strategic necessities.

178 Soccer requires little special equipment, other than a pair of shoes. Everybody believes he can play soccer. And it can be played by any number of players as a pickup game.

184 North America is truly a game for the masses that can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. Baseball and football are an exaltation of the human experience; soccer is its incarnation.

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193 Pelé is therefore a different phenomenon from the baseball or football star. Soccer stars are dependent on their teams even while transcending them. To achieve mythic status as a soccer player is especially difficult because the peak performance is generally quite short—only the fewest players perform at their peak for more than five years. Incredibly, Pelé performed at the highest level for 18 years, scoring 52 goals in 1973, his 17th year. Contemporary soccer superstars never reach even 50 goals a season. For Pelé, who had thrice

scored more than 100 goals a year, it signalled retirement.

213 The mythic status of Pelé derives as well from the way he incarnated the character of Brazil's national team. Its style affirms that virtue without joy is a contradiction in terms. Its players are the most acrobatic, if not always the most proficient. Brazilian teams play with a contagious exuberance. When those yellow shirts go on the attack—which is most of the

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[lc]

225 time—and their fans cheer to

226 the intoxicating beat of samba

227 bands, soccer becomes a ritual

228 of fluidity and grace. In Pelé's

229 day, the Brazilians epitomized

230 soccer as fantasy.

231 I saw Pelé at his peak only

232 once, at the final of the World

233 Cup in 1970. Brazil's opponent

234 was Italy, which played its

235 tough defense coupled with

236 sudden thrusts to score tie the

237 game 1-1, demoralizing the

238 Brazilians. Italy could very eas-

239 ily have massed its defense

240 even more, until its frantic op-

241 ponent began making the mis-

242 takes that would encompass its

243 ruin. But, led by Pelé, Brazil

244 paid no attention. Attacking as

245 if the Italians were a practice

246 team, the Brazilians ran them

247 into the ground 4-1.

248 I saw Pelé a few times af-

249 terward, when he was playing

250 for the New York Cosmos. He

251 was no longer as fast, but he

252 was as exuberant as ever. By

253 then, Pelé had become an in-

254 stitution. Most modern fans

255 have never seen him play, yet

256 they somehow feel he is part

Galley View: tpcle Page 8 5/25/1999 12:39 PM

KISSINGER TIME ARTICLE 5/10/99

Heroes walk alone, but they become myths when they
ennoble the lives and touch the hearts of all of us. For those
who love soccer, Edson Arantes dos Nasirmento, generally known
as Pele, is a hero.

Performance at a high level in any sport is to exceed the
ordinary human scale. But Pele's performance transcended that
of the ordinary star by as much as the star exceeds ordinary
performance. He scored an average of a goal in every
international game he played - the equivalent of a baseball
player hitting a homerun in every World Series game over 15
years. Between 1956 and 1974, Pele scored a total of 1220
goals - the equivalent of hitting an average of 70 home runs

2

every year for a decade and a half. While he played, Brazil
won three world championships in 12 years. He scored five
goals in a game six times, four goals 30 times and three goals
90 times.

And he did so not aloofly or disdainfully - as many
modern stars - but with an infectious joy that caused even the
teams over which he triumphed to share in his pleasure; for it
is no disgrace to be defeated by a phenomenon defying
emulation.

To understand Pele's role in soccer, some discussion of
the nature of the game is necessary. No team sport evokes the
same sort of primal, universal, passion as soccer. During the
quadrennial world cups, the matches of the national football
teams impose the television schedule on the rhythm of life.
Last year I attended a dinner for leading members of the
British establishment and distinguished guests from all over

[Y]

3

the world at the staid Spencer House in London. The hosts had
the bad luck to have chosen the night of the match between
England and Argentina - always a blood feud compounded on this
occasion by the memory of the Falklands crisis. The impeccable
audience (or at least enough of it to influence the host)
insisted that television sets be set up at strategic
locations, both during the reception and the dinner. The match
went into overtime and required a penalty shoot-out afterwards
so that the main speaker did not get to deliver his message
until 11 PM. And since England lost, the audience was not
precisely in a mood for anything but mourning.

When France finally won the World Cup, Paris was
paralyzed with joy for nearly 48 hours; Brazil by dejection
for a similar period of time. I was in Brazil in 1962 when the
national team won the World Cup in Chile. Everything stopped
for two days while Rio celebrated a premature carnival.

[Y]

4

There is no comparable phenomenon in the United States.

Baseball, for instance, requires a bundle of disparate skills:
hitting a ball thrown at 90 miles an hour; catching balls
flying at the speed of bullets; and throwing long distances
with great accuracy. Football requires a different set of
skills for each of its eleven positions. Both baseball and
football lend themselves to being broken down into a series of
individual performances capable of statistical analysis.

The American spectator thus finds himself viewing two
discrete events: what is actually taking place on the playing
field, and the translation of it into detailed and minute
statistics. He wants his team to win but he is also committed
to the statistical triumph of whatever star he admires.

[Y]

5

American sports heroes are like Joe DiMaggio - a kind of Lone Ranger - who walks in solitude beyond the reach of common experience, lifting us beyond ourselves.

Soccer is an altogether different sort of game. All eleven players must possess the same type of skills - especially in modern soccer, where the distinction between offensive and defensive players has dissolved. Being continuous, the game does not lend itself to being broken down into a series of component plays that, as in football or baseball, can be practiced. Baseball and football thrill by the perfection of their repetitions; soccer by the improvisation of solutions to ever-changing strategic necessities.

The roles of the coach are also quite different. The football coach designs the plays without which the game is inconceivable. In baseball, the basic plays are standard and

[Y]

6

the coach's role is to maintain cohesion and a sense of purpose. In soccer, there are very few standard plays. The game evolves in a great variety of patterns imposing different tactical imperatives. The coach must encourage inventiveness without being able to define it.

Soccer requires little special equipment other than a pair of shoes. Everybody believes he can play soccer. Unlike football or baseball, which are very hard to play with numbers different than the prescribed team size, soccer can be played by any number of players as a pickup game. Thus soccer outside North America is truly a game for the masses that can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. American sports are an exaltation of the human experience; soccer is its incarnation.

A soccer superstar like Pele is therefore a different phenomenon than the baseball or football star. Soccer stars

[Y]

7

are dependent on their teams even while transcending them. To achieve mythic status as a soccer player is especially difficult because the peak performance is generally quite short - only the fewest players perform at their peak for more than five years. Pele incredibly performed at the highest level for 18 years, scoring 55 goals in 1973, his 17th year, a feat not matched once by any contemporary superstars who never reach even 50 goals a season. But for Pele, who had scored over 100 goals three times, it signalled that it was time to retire.

The mythic status of Pele derives as well from the way he incarnated the character of Brazil's national team that, like those of its competitors, reflect national attitudes and styles - a little less so since television homogenized national styles to some extent. Still, a cognoscente would

[Y]

8

recognize the major national teams even if he were not told
what team he was viewing.

England (since all components of the United Kingdom field
separate teams) is solid, athletic, powerful, somewhat
stereotyped, never rattled; Germany is disciplined,
meticulously prepared with intricate strategic concepts but
given to bouts of melancholy; Italy is not for nothing the
country of Machiavelli. Its skilled operatives seek to turn
the adversary's psychology on himself by frustrating his
designs so much that the coup de grace feels like a
deliverance.

Brazil's style affirms that virtue without joy is a
contradiction in terms. Its players are the most acrobatic if
not always the most proficient. Brazilian teams play with a
contagious exuberance. When those yellow shirts go on the
attack - which is most of the time - and their fans cheer to

[Y]

9

the intoxicating beat of samba bands, soccer becomes a ritual
of fluidity and grace.

To be sure, Brazilian football has its limitations. The
players are occasionally so intoxicated by their acrobatics
that they forget the purpose of the exercise, which is to
score goals. Also, Brazil rarely fields an outstanding
goalkeeper. The task is apparently too lonely; a purely
defensive assignment apparently offends Brazil's self-image.

Today's Brazilian teams are more methodical and somewhat
less exuberant. But in Pele's day, they epitomized soccer as
fantasy. He, in turn, inspired his teams to unparalleled
heights. In the 1996 World Cup he scored on a penalty kick
from 40 yards out - the equivalent of a 600 foot homerun. Pele
played with good players on the national team as well as on
his club team of Santos, but he added an element of
electricity that has never been equalled. And he played with

[Y]

10

such extraordinary insouciance, so much effervescence, that
his opponents never felt humiliated. He achieved these
standards even though he became a marked man with constant
kicks on his shins and ankles.

Pele's chief rival in the realm of the mythic, the great
German midfielder Franz Beckenhauer, was a strategist. His
skill was to rally his team and to move it forward with
stunningly accurate passing. He scored goals relatively
rarely. Pele could pass very well; but he did so by instinct
rather than design. He inspired his team; Beckenhauer defeated
it.

I saw Pele at his peak only once, at the final of the
World Cup in 1970. Brazil's opponent was Italy, which had
eliminated Germany in a grinding overtime match. Italy played
its characteristic style: tough defense coupled with sudden
thrusts to score a first goal. And when an Italian team gets

11

ahead, it masses its defense even more until its frantic
opponent begins making the mistakes that encompass its ruin.

Indeed, Italy scored first. But Brazil, led by Pele, paid
no attention. Attacking as if the Italian defenders were a
practice team, they ran them into the ground with a final
score of 4:1 with Pele scoring two goals*.

I saw Pele a few times afterwards, at the end of his
career when he was playing for the New York Cosmos. He was no
longer as fast as before and was not surrounded by Brazilians,
which cramped his style. But he was as exuberant as ever. Pele
had the rare quality of making everybody he met happy.

Afterwards, he became an ambassador of Brazilian soccer, and
though his quarrels with the head of the international
governing body of soccer (FIFA) kept him from an official role
in the world of soccer after 1994, the Brazilian government

*Check figure.

[Y]

12

remedied this by appointing him as Minister of Sports in the
first Cardozo term in 1994.

By then, Pele had become an institution. Although most
modern fans have never seen him play, they somehow feel he is
part of their lives. He had made the transition from superstar
to mythic figure.

1636 WORDS

KISSINGER TIME ARTICLE 5/8/99 II

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Pele's chief rival in the realm of the mythic, the great
German midfielder Franz Beckenhauer, was a strategist. His
skill was to rally his team and to move it forward with
stunningly accurate passing. He scored goals relatively
rarely. Pele could pass very well; but he did so by instinct.
rather than design. He inspired his team; Beckenhauer *dominated*
it. He also defeated

11

*Check figure.

12

MAY-08-1999 16:37

FROM

TO

15617450358

P.01

1698 WORDS

KISSINGER TIME ARTICLE 5/8/99

Heroes walk alone, but they become myths when they touch
touch the lives and hearts of all of us. For those who love soccer,
Edson Arantes dos Nasirmento, generally known as Pele, is a
Lerion myth.

Lerion myth.

~~Leron performance~~ at a high level in any sport [means trying]...
to exceed the ordinary human scale. But Pele's performance
transcended that of the ordinary star by as much as the star
exceeds ordinary performance. He scored an average of a goal
in every international game he played - the equivalent of a
baseball player hitting a homerun in every World Series game
[between 1956 and 1974]
over 15 years. Pele scored a total of 1220 goals in his career ->

' MAY-08-1999 16:38 FROM

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15617450358 P.02

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the equivalent of hitting an average of 70 home runs over a decade and a half. While he played 20 years, he led Brazil to three world championships in soccer over a period of 12 years. He served five goals in a game six times, four goals 30-times and three goals 90 times.

And he did so not only or disdainfully but with an infectious joy that caused even the teams over which he triumphed to share in his pleasure; for it is no disgrace to be defeated by a phenomenon totally beyond the human scale and defying imitation.

MAY-08-1999 16:38 FROM

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the world at the staid Spencer House in London. The hosts had the bad luck to have chosen the night of the match between England and Argentina - always a blood feud compounded on this occasion by the memory of the Falklands crisis. The impeccable audience (or at least enough of it to influence the host) insisted that television sets be set up at strategic locations, both during the reception and the dinner. The match went into overtime and required a penalty shoot-out so that the main speaker did not get to deliver his message until 11 PM. And since England lost, the audience was not precisely in a mood for anything but mourning.

In most other countries, the reaction was more demonstrative. Victories evoke vast public demonstrations; defeat elicits national despair. When France won the World Cup in 1998, Paris was paralyzed with joy for nearly 48 hours; Brazil by dejection for a similar period of time. I was in

MAY-08-1999 16:38 FROM

TO

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[Y]

4

Brazil in 1962 when Pele was the national team to win the World Cup in Chile. Everything stopped for two days while Rio celebrated a premature carnival.

Our fans do not identify with their teams in such a way partly because American team sports are more cerebral and require a degree of skill that is beyond the imagination of the layman.

MAY-08-1999 16:39 FROM

TO

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5

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The roles of the coach are ~~therefore~~ also quite different. The football coach designs the plays without which the game is inconceivable. In baseball, the basic plays are standard and the coach's role is to maintain cohesion and a sense of purpose. In soccer, there are very few standard plays. The game evolves in a great variety of patterns imposing different tactical imperatives. The coach must encourage inventiveness without being able to define it.

~~Soccer is thus a less elitist sport than either baseball or football.~~ It requires little special equipment other than a pair of shoes. Unlike football or baseball, which are very hard to play with numbers different than the prescribed team size, soccer can be played by any number of players as a pickup game. Thus soccer outside North America is truly a game for the masses that can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. American sports

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[Y]

7

are an exaltation of the human experience; soccer its
incarnation.

A soccer superstar like Pele is therefore a different phenomenon than the baseball or football star. Soccer stars are dependent on their teams even while transcending them. To achieve mythic status as a soccer player is especially difficult because the peak performance generally extends only over a period of a few years - only the fewest players perform at their peak for more than five years. Pele incredibly performed at the highest level for 18 years, scoring 55 goals in 1973, his 17th year, a feat not matched once by any (impossible) but for contemporary stars. But Pele scored over 100 goals three times, it signalled that it was time to retire.

The mythic status of Pele derives as well from the way he
incarnated the character of Brazil's national teams. For these
competitors in many ways have generally reflected national attitudes

MAY-08-1999 16:40 FROM

TO

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and styles - a little less [so] since television homogenized
national styles to some extent. Still, a cognoscente would
recognize the major ~~teams~~ national teams even if he were not told what team
he was viewing.

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TO

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[Y]

9

contagious exuberance. When those yellow shirts go on the attack - which is most of the time - and their fans cheer to the intoxicating beat of samba bands, the joyfulness of Brazilian soccer becomes the expression of the fluidity and power of the imagination of the game. Wave after wave of yellow shirts collides against the opposing goal until the opposition is overwhelmed.

Today's Brazilian teams are more methodical and somewhat less exuberant. But in Pele's day, they epitomized the glory of soccer. In turn, they drew his teams to unparalleled

MAY-08-1999 16:40 FROM

TO

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heights. In the 1996 World Cup he scored on a penalty kick that was equivalent to a 600 foot kick from 40 yards out. He played with good players on the national team as well as on his club team of Santos, but he added an element of electricity that has never been equalled. He scored 1620 goals in his career, almost unimaginable today when scoring 45 goals a season marks a superstar. And he played with such extraordinary insouciance, so much effervescence, that his opponents never felt humiliated. And he did these standards even though he became a marked man with constant kicks to his shins and ankles.

Pele's chief rival in the realm of the mythic, the great German midfielder Franz Beckenhauer, was a strategist. His skill was to rally his team and to move it forward with stunningly accurate passing. He scored goals relatively rarely. Pele could pass very well; but he did so by instinct, talent, and determination.

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11

His purpose ~~was to score goals, to find the empty space~~ and
the ~~surprising thrust. ~~

I saw Pele at his peak only once, at the final of the
World Cup in 1970. Brazil's opponent was Italy, which had
eliminated Germany in a grinding overtime match. Italy played
its characteristic style: tough defense coupled with sudden
thrusts to score a first goal. And when an Italian team gets
ahead, it masses its defense even more until its frantic
opponent begins making the mistakes that encompass its ruin.

Indeed, Italy scored first. But Brazil, led by Pele, paid
no attention. Attacking as if the Italian defenders were a
practice team, they ran them into the ground with a final
score of 4:1 with Pele scoring two goals (clock)

MAY-08-1999 16:41 FROM

TO

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[Y]

12

Afterwards, he became an ambassador of Brazilian soccer, and
though his quarrels with the head of the international
governing body of soccer (PIFA) kept him from an official role
in the world of soccer after 1994, the Brazilian government
remedied this by appointing him as Minister of Sports in the
first Cardozo term in 1994.

By then, Pele had become an institution. Although most
modern fans have never seen him play, they somehow feel he is
part of their lives. He had moved from superstar to
inspiration, becoming a figure

TOTAL P.12

1698 WORDS

KISSINGER TIME ARTICLE 5/8/99

Heroes walk alone, but they become myths when they touch
the lives and hearts of all of us. For those who love soccer,
Edson Arantes dos Nasirmento, generally known as Pele, is a
myth.

Performance at a high level in any sport [means trying]
to exceed the ordinary human scale. But Pele's performance
transcended that of the ordinary star by as much as the star
exceeds ordinary performance. He scored an average of a goal
in every international game he played - the equivalent of a
baseball player hitting a homerun in every World Series game
over 15 years. Pele scored a total of 1220 goals in his career

2

- the equivalent of hitting an average of 60 home runs over a period of 20 years. He led Brazil to three world championships in soccer over a period of 12 years. He served five goals in a game six times, four goals 30 times and three goals 90 times.

And he did so not al____ or disdainfully but with an infectious joy that caused even the teams over which he triumphed to share in his pleasure; for it is no disgrace to be defeated by a phenomenon totally beyond the human scale and defying imitation.

[Y]

3

In most other countries, the reaction is even more
demonstrative. Victories evoke vast public demonstrations;
defeat elicits national despair. When France won the World Cup
in 1998, Paris was paralyzed with joy for nearly 48 hours;
Brazil by dejection for a similar period of time. I was in

[Y]

4

Brazil in 1962 when Pele led the national team to victory in the World Cup in Chile. Everything stopped for two days while Rio celebrated a premature carnival.

There is no comparable phenomenon in the United States. Our fans do not identify with their teams in such a way partly because American team sports are more cerebral and require a degree of skill that is beyond the imagination of the layman. Baseball, for instance, requires a bundle of disparate skills: hitting a ball thrown at 90 miles an hour; catching balls flying at the speed of bullets; and throwing long distances with great accuracy. Football requires a different set of skills for each of its eleven positions. Both baseball and football lend themselves to being broken down into a series of individual performances capable of statistical analysis.

[Y]

5

[Y]

6

The roles of the coach are therefore also quite different. The football coach designs the plays without which the game is inconceivable. In baseball, the basic plays are standard and the coach's role is to maintain cohesion and a sense of purpose. In soccer, there are very few standard plays. The game evolves in a great variety of patterns imposing different tactical imperatives. The coach must encourage inventiveness without being able to define.

Soccer is thus a less elitist sport than either baseball or football. It requires little special equipment other than a pair of shoes. Unlike football or baseball, which are very hard to play with numbers different than the prescribed team size, soccer can be played by any number of players as a pickup game. Thus soccer outside North America is truly a game for the masses that can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. American sports

[Y]

7

A soccer superstar like Pele is therefore a different
phenomenon than the baseball or football star. Soccer stars
are dependent on their teams even while transcending them. To
achieve mythic status as a soccer player is especially
difficult because the peak performance generally extends only
over a period of a few years - only the fewest players perform
at their peak for more than five years. Pele incredibly
performed at the highest level for 18 years, scoring 55 goals
in 1973, his 17th year, a feat not matched once by any
contemporary star. But ____ Pele scored over 100 goals three
times, it signalled that it was time to retire.

The mythic status of Pele derives as well from the way he
incarnated the character of Brazil's national teams. For these
teams in many ways have generally reflected national attitudes

8

and styles - a little less [so] since television homogenized
national styles to some extent. Still, a cognoscente would
recognize the major teams even if he were not told what team
he was viewing.

[Y]

9

contagious exuberance. When those yellow shirts go on the attack - which is most of the time - and their fans cheer to the intoxicating beat of samba bands, the joyfulness of Brazilian soccer becomes the expression of the fluidity and the imagination of the game. Wave after wave of yellow shirts rolls against the opposing goal until the opposition is overwhelmed.

Today's Brazilian teams are more methodical and somewhat less exuberant. But in Pele's day, they epitomized the glory of soccer. He, in turn, drove his teams to unparalleled

[Y]

10

heights. In the 1996 World Cup he scored on a penalty kick from 40 yards out. He played with good players on the national team as well as on his club team of Santos, but Pele added an element of electricity that has never been equalled. He scored 1220 goals in his career, almost unimaginable today when scoring 45 goals a season marks a superstar. And he played with such extraordinary insouciance, so much effervescence, that his opponents never felt humiliated. And he did these even though he became a marked man with constant kicks in his shins and ankles.

[Y]

11

His purpose was to score goals, to find the empty space and
the surprising thrust.

Indeed, Italy scored first. But Brazil, led by Pele, paid
no attention. Attacking as if the Italian defenders were a
practice team, they ran them into the ground with a final
score of 4:1 with Pele scoring two goals.

12

Afterwards, he became an ambassador of Brazilian soccer, and
though his quarrels with the head of the international
governing body of soccer (FIFA) kept him from an official role
in the world of soccer after 1994, the Brazilian government
remedied this by appointing him as Minister of Sports in the
first Cardozo? term.

By then, Pele had become an institution. Although most
modern fans have never seen him play, they somehow feel he is
part of their lives. He had moved from superstar to
inspiration.

MAY-08-1999 08:30 FROM

TO

15617450358 P.04

[Y]

4 where modern soccer, which has dissolved the distinction between offensive and defensive players. Being continuous, the game does not lend itself to being broken down into a series of component individual plays that, as in football or baseball, can be practiced. Baseball and football thrill by the perfection of their repetitions; soccer by the working-out of tactical solutions to ever-changing demands of the moment as well as strategic necessities. The role of the coach is therefore quite different. The football coach designs the plays, the game is inconceivable, without him, in baseball, the basic and plays are standards. The coach's role is to maintain cohesion and a sense of purpose. In soccer, there are standard plays, the game evolves in a great variety of winning different tactical situations. patterns. The coach must encourage inventiveness without being able to define.

MAY-08-1999 08:30

FROM

TO

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5

Soccer is also a less elitist sport than baseball or football. It requires little special equipment other than a pair of shoes. Unlike football or baseball, which are very hard to play with numbers different than the prescribed team size, soccer can be played by any number of players as a pickup game. Thus soccer outside North America is truly a game for the masses that can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. Unlike American sports, it is not an exaltation of the human experience but its incarnation.

The soccer star is therefore a different phenomenon than the baseball or football star. He is more similar to Michael Jordan, the superstar of professional basketball. Both soccer and basketball stars evolve from their teams even while transcending them. But basketball has only five players from whose interaction the superstar emerges; soccer has eleven.

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[Y]

Pele's chief rival for mythic quality, the great German medfrildie Libby Franz Beckenhauer, was a strategist. His skill was to rally his team and to move it forward with stunningly accurate passing. He scored goals relatively rarely. Pele could pass very well; but he did so by instinct. His purpose was to score goals, to find the empty space and the surprising thrust.

I saw Pele at his peak only once, at the final of the World Cup in 1970. Brazil's opponent was Italy, which had eliminated Germany in a fine overtime match. Italy played its characteristic style: tough defense coupled with sudden thrusts to score a first goal. And when an Italian team gets ahead, it masses its defense even more until its frantic opponent makes mistakes leading to its ruin.

And, indeed, Italy scored first. But Brazil, led by Pele, paid no attention. Attacking as if the Italian defenders were

MAY-08-1999 08:32 FROM

TO

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[Y]

10

I saw Pele a few times afterwards, at the end of his career when he was playing for the New York Cosmos. He was no longer as fast as ~~previously~~ before and he was not surrounded by Brazilians, which cramped his style. But he was as exuberant as ever and as ~~undemanding~~ as Pele had the rare quality of making everybody he met happy. Afterwards, he had become an ambassador of Brazilian soccer, and though his quarrels with the head of the international governing body of soccer (FIFA) after 1994 kept him from an official role in the world of soccer, the Brazilian government re-mked it by appointing him as Minister of Sports in the first lacrosse term.

By then Pele had become an institution. All but the smallest teams now play their games in part of their deals, here He had made his mark as a superstar & inspiration.

*Needs to be checked.*

1439 WORDS

KISSINGER TIME ARTICLE 5/7/99

No team sport evokes the almost primeval and universal
passions. During the quadrennial world cups, the matches of
the national football teams tend to adapt the rhythm of life
to the television schedule. Last year I attended a dinner at
staid Spencer House for leading members of the British
establishment and distinguished guests from all over the
world. To the bad luck of the hosts, it was the night of the
match between England and Argentina - always a blood feud
compounded on this occasion by the memory of the Falklands
crisis. The impeccable audience? (or at least enough of them
to influence the host) insisted that television sets be set up
at strategic locations during both the reception and the

[Y]

2

dinner. Since the match went into overtime and required a penalty shoot-out?, the main speaker did not get to deliver his message until 11 PM. And since England lost, the atmosphere was not precisely festive.

In most other countries, the reaction is far [more] demonstrative. Victories evoke vast public demonstrations; defeat elicits national mourning. When France won the World Cup in 1998, Paris was paralyzed by joy for nearly 48 hours; Brazil by dejection for a similar period.

There is no comparable phenomenon in the United States. Our fans do not identify with their teams in such a way partly because American team sports are more cerebral and require a degree of skill beyond the imagination of the layman. Baseball is based on totally disparate skills: in hitting a ball thrown at 90 miles an hour; in catching balls flying at the speed of bullets; and throwing long distances with great accuracy.

[Y]

3

Football requires a different set of skills for each of its positions. Each game lends itself to being broken down into a series of individual performances capable of statistical analysis.

The American spectator thus watches two discrete events: what takes place on the playing field, and its translation into minute statistics. He wants his team to win but he is also committed to the statistical performance of whatever star he admires. He can admire his hero but not really identify with him because his performance is so obviously beyond the ability of ordinary mortals. American sports heroes are like Joe DiMaggio - a kind of Lone Ranger - who walks in solitude beyond the reach of common experience, ad____ for lifting us beyond ourselves.

Soccer is a different kind of team game. All eleven players must possess the same type of skills - especially in

[Y]

4

modern soccer, which has dissolved the distinction between
offensive and defensive players. Being continuous, the game
does not lend itself to being broken down into a series of
individual plays that, as in football or baseball, can be
practiced. Baseball and football thrill by the perfection of
their repetitions; soccer by the working out of tactical
solutions to ever-changing demands of the moment as well as
strategic necessities. The role of the coach is therefore
quite different. The football coach designs the plays; the
game is inconceivable without him. In baseball, the basic
plays are standard; the coach's role is to maintain cohesion
and a sense of purpose. In soccer, there are _evy for
standard plays; the game evolves in a great variety of
patterns. The coach must encourage inventiveness without being
able to define.

[Y]

5

Soccer is also a less elitist sport than baseball or football. It requires little special equipment other than a pair of shoes. Unlike football or baseball, which are very hard to play with numbers different than the prescribed team size, soccer can be played by any number of players as a pickup? game. Thus soccer outside North America is truly a game for the masses that can identify with its passions, its sudden triumphs and its inevitable disillusionments. Unlike American sports, it is not an exaltation of the human experience but its incarnation.

[Y]

6

The soccer superstar is therefore more dependent on his colleagues and requires an even more heroic effort to transcend them. To achieve mythic status as a soccer player is much more difficult because the peak performance generally extends only over a period of a few years - only the fewest players perform at their peak for more than five years.

The mythic status of star soccer players derives as well from their ability to incarnate the character of their national teams, which in many ways reflect national attitudes and styles - at least before television homogenized national styles to some extent. Still, the cognoscente would recognize the major teams even if he were not told what team he was viewing.

England (since all components of the United Kingdom field separate teams) - solid, athletic, powerful, somewhat stereotyped composed; Germany - disciplined, meticulously

[Y]

7

pro____ with intricate strategic concepts and given to bouts
of melancholy; Italy - Machiavellian, skilled at ____ing the
adversary's psychology on himself, seeking to break the will
of the opponent before delivering the coup de grace.

Brazil is in a class by itself. Its style affirms that
v____ without is a contradiction in terms. Its players are the
most acrobatic if not always the most proficient. Brazilian
teams play with a contagious exuberance. When those yellow
shirts go on the attack - which is most of the time - and
their fans cheer to the intoxicating beat of samba bands the
joyfulness of Brazilian soccer, the fans are the acme of the
fluidity and the imagination of the game. Wave after wave of
yellow shirts rolls against the opposing goal until the
opposition is overwhelmed.

[Y]

8

that they forget the purpose of the exercise, which is to
score goals. Also, Brazil rarely fields an outstanding
goalkeeper. The task is apparently too lonely; a purely
defensive assignment apparently offends Brazil's image of
itself.

Today's Brazilian teams are more methodical and somewhat
less exuberant. But in Pele's day, they epitomized the glory
of soccer and he, in turn, drove his teams to unparalleled
heights. He had good players on the national team as well as
on his club team of Santes, but Pele added an element of
electricity that has never been equalled. He scored 1220 goals
in his career, almost unimaginable today when scoring 45 goals
a season marks a superstar. And he played with extraordinary
insouciance; his playing was so effervescent that even his
opponents could take pleasure in it. It is no humiliation to
be defeated by a style that permits no imitation.

[Y]

9

Pele's chief rival for mythic quality, the great German libiro? Franz Beckenhauer, was a strategist. His skill was to rally his team and to move it forward with stunningly accurate passing. He scored goals relatively rarely. Pele could pass very well; but he did so by instinct. His purpose was to score goals, to find the empty space and the surprising thrust.

I saw Pele at his peak only once, at the final of the World Cup in 1970. Brazil's opponent was Italy, which had eliminated Germany in a ge______ overtime match. Italy played its characteristic style: tough defense coupled with sudden thrusts to score a first goal. And when an Italian team gets ahead, it masses its defense even more until its frantic opponent makes mistakes leading to its ruin.

10

I saw Pele a few times afterwards, at the end of his career when he was playing for the New York Cosmos. He was no longer as fast as previously and he was not surrounded by Brazilians, which cramped his style. But he was as exuberant as ever and as undemanding?. Pele had the rare quality of making everybody he met happy. Afterwards, he had become an ambassador of Brazilian soccer, and though his quarrels with the head of the international governing body of soccer (FIFA) kept him from an official role in the world of soccer, the Brazilian government re__ed it by appointing him as Minister of Sports.

*Needs to be checked.