A la Sombra de las botas inmortales

by Nelson Rodrigues, Juanjo Berdullas (Translator)

La edición ya debida de A pátria en chuteiras celebra en castellano un clásico mayúsculo de la literatura deportiva, que canonizó en el Brasil de los sesenta la crónica futbolística como pieza de estilo y como género. En unas columnas que de algún modo corren parejas a las que publicó irrepetiblemente por los mismos años sobre lances de infidelidad conyugal (No tengo la culpa de que la vida sea como es, Días Contados, lusitana 4(40), 2018), Nelson Rodrigues relata con feliz y arrebatada desinhibición el ascenso y consagración de la selección carioca en los tres campeonatos mundiales de 1958, 1962 y 1970. Y proclama con ellos una voluntad cívica de entonar el plural consustancial al fenómeno de masas (o a la nación), más como celebración festiva que como acrimonia. Como su escritura: una alegría de vivir. "Lo que yo me pregunto es si un brasileño debe aceptar en su propia tierra una bofetada de un peruano. Hay buena parte de la prensa que piensa que sí. Considera un «espectáculo degradante» el uso que hicimos de la legítima defensa. Hubo una tangana. ¿Y qué? En Inglaterra es mil veces peor. Allí se pelean los veintidós jugadores, las dos aficiones, el árbitro, los jueces de línea y hasta los recogepelotas. Después se van todos a la estación a destrozar locomotoras. Es un pueblo gigantesco, que salvó al mundo. Si en Dunquerque Inglaterra hubiera capitulado, los nazis celebrarían pruebas hípicas montando a brasileños".

Genres: Literature, Ebooks

289 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1992

About the author

Nelson Falcão Rodrigues (August 23, 1912 – December 21, 1980) was a Brazilian playwright, journalist and novelist. In 1943, he helped usher in a new era in Brazilian theater with his play Vestido de Noiva (The Wedding Dress), considered revolutionary for the complex exploration of its characters' psychology and its use of colloquial dialog. He went on to write many other seminal plays and today is widely regarded as Brazil's greatest playwright.

Nelson Rodrigues was born on August 23, 1912 in Recife, the capital of the Brazilian state of Pernambuco, to Mario Rodrigues, a journalist, and his wife, Maria Esther Falcão. In 1916, the family moved to Rio de Janeiro after Mario ran into trouble for criticizing a powerful local politician. In Rio, Mario rose through the ranks of one of the city's major newspaper and, in 1925, launched his own newspaper, a sensationalist daily. By fourteen Nelson was covering the police beat for his father; by fifteen he had dropped out of school; and by sixteen he was writing his own column. The family's economic situation improved steadily, allowing them to move from lower-middle class Zona Norte to what was then the exclusive neighborhood of Copacabana.

In less than two years the family's fortunes would be reversed spectacularly. In 1929, older brother Roberto, a talented graphic artist, was shot and killed at the newspaper offices by a society lady who objected to the salacious coverage of her divorce. Devastated by his son's death, Mario Rodrigues died a few months later of a stroke, and shortly after that the family newspaper was closed by military forces supporting the Revolution of 1930, which the newspaper had fiercely opposed in its editorials. The ensuing years were dark ones for the Rodrigues family, and Nelson and his brothers were forced to seek work at rival newspapers for low wages. To make matters worse, in 1934 Nelson was diagnosed with tuberculosis, a disease that plagued him, on an off, for the next ten years.

During this time Rodrigues held various jobs including comic strip editor, sports columnists and opera critic. In 1941, he wrote his first play A Mulher Sem Pecado (The Woman Without Sin), to mixed reviews. His following play, Vestido de Noiva (The Wedding Dress), was hailed as a watershed in Brazilian theater and is considered among his masterpieces. It began a fruitful collaboration with Polish émigré director Zbigniew Ziembinski, who is reported to have said on reading The Wedding Dress, "I am unaware of anything in world theater today that resembles this." In the play, set while the female chief character is hit by a car in the street and undergoes surgery, the stage is divided in three planes: one for real life action happening around the character, another for her memories, a third for her dying hallucinations. As the three planes overlap, actual reality melds with memory and delusion[1].

Rodrigues's next play, 1946 Álbum de família (Family Album)- the chronicle of a semi-mythical family living outside society and mired in incest, rape and murder - was so controversial that it was censored and only allowed to be staged 21 years later.

In all, Rodrigues wrote 17 full-length plays. They include Toda Nudez Será Castigada (All Nudity Shall Be Punished), Dorotéia, and Beijo no Asfalto (The Asphalt Kiss, or , better, The Kiss on Asphalt[2]), all considered classics of the Brazilian stage. His plays are frequently divided in three groups: Psychological, mythical and Carioca tragedies. In his Carioca tragedies Rodrigues explored the lives of Rio’s lower-middle class, a population never deemed worthy of the stage before Rodrigues. From the beginning his plays shocked audiences and attracted the attention of censors.

In spite of his success as a playwright, Rodrigues never dedicated himself exclusively to theater. In the 1950s, besides writing the hugely successful column A Vida Como Ela É (Life As It Is), he also wrote soap operas, movie scripts, a

Reviews

[Marina Guerra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ninguém escreve sobre futebol como Nelson Rodrigues.

[Gustavo Lima · Rating 5 out of 5]

Genial!

[Hélio Pinto · Rating 5 out of 5]

impressionante como nada muda.