Pelé

Athlete, sports commentator

At a Glance…

From the Santos Club to the World Cup Tournament

The Man, the Myth, and the Power of Politics

Sources

Retired Brazilian soccer player Edson Arantes do Nascimento, better known as Pelé, is among the greatest and most celebrated sports superstars of his era. Even in the United States, where enthusiasm for soccer is eclipsed by the popularity of American football, Pelé’s name is synonymous with his sport. Having made his first appearance in the prestigious World Cup championship competition at the age of 18, the record-breaking inside left forward thrilled the sports world with his on-field agility throughout the 1960s and 1970s.

He repeatedly led his national team to victory in international championships, wowing audiences with his near-impossible plays and his uncanny ability to anticipate the moves of his opponents. At one time the highest paid athlete in the world, he ended his soccer career in 1977 with 1,280 goals, a record surpassed only by fellow Brazilian Artur Friedenreich.

Brazil is an enormous country in eastern South America, taking up nearly half of the continent’s land mass. Claimed by the Portuguese in 1500 AD, it became an independent state in the nineteenth century. Although the Portuguese influence remains in Brazil—it is the largest Portuguese-speaking nation in the world—its population is multiracial, with an ethnic mix of Portuguese, Italian, German, Japanese, Amerindian, and Black peoples.

Soccer is Brazil’s best-loved sport. The winner of the World Cup in 1958, 1962, and 1970 (and runner-up in 1950), Brazil has earned a lasting image as a leader in the world soccer community. The game is believed to have been introduced to the nation in 1894 by a wealthy Brazilian-bom Englishman named Charles Miller. Within two decades, soccer would become a true game of the people, not just a sport for the rich. Immigrants from Italy, Spain, and Portugal flooded Brazil in the early twentieth century looking for work; many of these workers were captivated by the game and learned to play it. But, although the face of Brazil’s national team began to change with the addition of European immigrant players, it was not until 1909 that Friedenreich, the first player of racially mixed heritage, broke the country’s color barrier.

Pelé is revered as a sports icon in his home country and throughout the world. An incident witnessed in Rio de Janeiro by Sport magazine contributor Joel Millman illustrates this point. An appliance shop was showing

At a Glance…

Born Edson Arantes do Nascimento, October 23, 1940, in Três Corações, Minas Gerais, Brazil; professionally known as “peté” or Perola Negra ( “Black Pearl“); son of Joao Ramos do Nascimento (also known as “Dondinho” a minor league soccer player and civil servant) married first wife, ftosemarie Chol by, February 1966 (divorced, 1978); married second wife, Assíria Seixas Lemos (a psychologist}, April 30, 1994; children: three (first marriage).

Professional soccer player, 1956-77. Began playing soccer as a child in Bauru, Brazil; played in Bauru Club, 1950-54; played with Santos Football Club, 1956-72; retired for the first time, 1972; played with New York Cosmos, 1975-77; retired permanently, 1977. Made first World Cup appearance at age 17; scored 1, 280 goals (including a record 92 hat tricks) over the course of career. Later employed in numerous promotional sponsorship programs. Author, with Robert L. Fish, of My Life and the Beautiful Game: The Autobiography of Pelé, 1977.

Awards: Latin American Footballer of the Year, 1973; Brazil’s stadium Maceió Estadio Reí Pelé is named for him.

Addresses: c/o Confederacao Brasileira de Desportos, Rua de Alfandega 70, P.O. Box 1078, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

video-clips of Pelé’s greatest moments in successive World Cup championships. “A father standing in front of an appliance store on Avenida Presidente Vargas [shows] his son how Pelé re-created soccer,” wrote Millman. “The grey and white footage floats by: Pelé, his forward movement a tumble of windmill arms and swivel legs, leaps past two defenders, bounces the ball off the turf before him then off his puffing chest then to his right foot before sending it past the diving goalie. ’Stockholm,’ the father murmers, squeezing the son’s elbow.” The father was referring to Pelé’s brilliant World Cup debut in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1958; young Pelé helped usher in a new era of Brazilian supremacy in soccer.

Called the Perola Negra, or “Black Pearl,” by some of his compatriots, Edson Arantes do Nascimento showed raw talent for soccer as a child. He picked up the nickname Pelé—the meaning of which is unknown even to him— on the soccer field. Pelé was bom October 23,1940, in the small village of Três Corações, Minas Gerais, Brazil. His father, Joao Ramos do Nascimento, was, for a time, a center forward with a minor league Brazilian soccer club in Bauru, São Paulo.

Pelé’s earliest dreams were of becoming a professional soccer player. He dropped out of school when he was nine years old and received early coaching in soccer from his father. By the time he was 13, Pelé had captured the attention of World Cup great Waldemar de Brito, manager of Bauru. After a couple of years on the Bauru junior team, Pelé became one of the club’s best players.

In 1956, de Brito took the soccer prodigy to the seacoast city of Santos, where Coach Luis Alonso Perez let him try out for the Santos Football Club. Before long, Pelé had moved up from the Santos junior team to the first team reserves. By the end of the year, he was promoted to the first team’s starting lineup, where he enjoyed continued success.

From the Santos Club to the World Cup Tournament

With Pelé on the team, the Santos Football Club became a powerful force in Brazilian soccer, winning nine São Paulo championships between 1958 and 1969. Pelé first seized the imagination of the international soccer world as a 17-year-old member of the Brazilian National Team at the finals of the 1958 World Cup championship, held in Stockholm. His masterful performance on the field, including two legendary goals against the host country, helped lead Brazil to its first world championship.

Injuries kept Pelé out of Brazil’s second World Cup win in 1962, but he led Santos to victories against Europe’s top teams in the Copa Libertadores and the Intercontinental Cup in 1962 and 1963. But as Pelé’s reputation grew, so too did infighting on the international soccer circuit. The Santos Club’s opponents focused all their efforts on “getting”—and in some cases incapacitating—Pelé, the mainstay of the team. Referees seemed indifferent to the illegal knee and elbow shots inflicted on him by his competitors.

“Nobody in the game had more fun than I did when I first became professional,” Pelé commented in the 1966 edition of International Football Book. “This honeymoon came to an abrupt end around 1960…. I’ve been kicked from pillar to post, particularly in those up-country league games where the home team decide this is the only way to stop Pelé and Santos. At first I was shocked, and then I became angry. Sometimes I hit back and because my name was Pelé, news of such incidents made every newspaper in Brazil. Nobody ever bothered to write about what started the whole business…. In this mood I sometimes feel like giving up football altogether, but I carry on because those few precious moments of pleasure from football mean more to me than anything else.”

In spite of Brazil’s elimination from World Cup contention by England in 1966, the team came back in 1970 to take its third world championship—at that time, an unprecedented feat. Pelé drew international attention for his larger-than-life demeanor and his extraordinary athletic prowess: his ingenious plays, unparalleled agility, devotion to team effort, and sincere love of the game made him a cultural icon.

Two years later, at the age of 32, Pelé retired from professional soccer. He was content to cap off his career with his triumphant performance in the 1970 World Cup—Brazil’s first victory to be televised—and he resisted pressure from both sports and government officials to play in the World Cup in ’74. But his retirement was not permanent. Following a streak of bad investments that left him near financial ruin, he was forced to return to the field in the mid-1970s. Signing a $3.5 million contract with the New York Cosmos, Pelé officially joined the American club in ’75 and remained there for two and a half seasons, giving “U.S. soccer a significant boost” in the process, according to an Associated Press report. He retired permanently in 1977.

The Man, the Myth, and the Power of Politics

Brazil was steeped in political turmoil in the mid-1960s, when the republic was overturned by a coup and replaced by a military-backed dictatorial regime. In 1979, as Brazil’s economy was bottoming out and the military junta contemplated a return to civilian rule, Pelé drew sharp criticism from supporters of democracy in his country. Distancing himself from the political tumult, he failed to use his tremendous influence and near-mythic status to rally around the call for liberalization in Brazil; he stated quite simply that he was an athlete, not a politician, telling Millman: “I play to make people happy. If we win there are still problems but at least the people get to be happy for several months.”

Political controversy aside, Pelé is still widely regarded as the greatest soccer star who ever lived—even more than 15 years after his retirement. But he revealed the burden of his superstar status to Millman, explaining: “Very few people know Edson. Edson is the normal person, he has defects. One day he is going to be dead. But Pelé, he cannot make a mistake…. I have to deal with both, but I think the bigger responsibility is for Edson, because he was born first. I don’t know why I became Pelé. God only knows.”

After his retirement in 1977, Pelé became a sports commentator and the leading promoter of soccer in the United States. “It is a mission,” Pelé told E.M. Swift in Sports Illustrated. “To bring soccer to the countries where [the sport] is undeveloped, this is my passion. I want to see soccer all over the world.” As a spokesperson for FIFA, soccer’s governing body, he captured the American limelight in 1994, when the World Cup came to Detroit, Michigan. And in a lavish ceremony held on the Brazilian coast that spring, Pelé married his second wife, Assíria Seixas Lemos.

Sources

Books

Condon, Robert J., The Fifty Finest Athletes of the 20th Century: A Worldwide Reference, McFarland, 1990.

Pelé and Robert L. Fish, My Life and the Beautiful Game: The Autobiography of Pelé, Doubleday, 1977.

The World Encyclopedia of Soccer, edited by Michael L. La Blanc and Richard Henshaw, Gale, 1994.

Periodicals

Christian Science Monitor, November 5, 1964.

New York Times, December 2, 1962, p. 7; September 6, 1966.

Reader’s Digest, November 1964.

Sport, December 1986, pp. 120-23.

Sports Illustrated, October 24, 1966, p. 77; June 20, 1994, pp. 87-90.

Additional information for this profile was taken from the 1966 edition of the International Football Book and from Associated Press wire reports dated April 11, 1994 and May 1, 1994.

—Barbara Carlisle Bigelow

Pele

Pele (born 1940), called "the Black Pearl, " was the greatest soccer player in the history of the game. With a career total of 1, 280 games, he may have been the world's most popular athlete.

Edson Arantes Do Nascimento Pele, who took the name Pele, was born October 23, 1940, in Tres Coracoes, Brazil, the son of a soccer player. His father's coaching paid off, for when he was 11 he played for his first soccer team, that of the town of Bauru, Brazil. He moved up in competition with outstanding play, and when he was 15 he was playing for the team from the village of Santos. He soon received broader exposure when he was loaned to the Vasco da Gama team in Rio di Janeiro.

In 1958 he went to Stockholm, Sweden to compete in the World Cup championship. His play there helped his country win its first title. He returned to Santos, and his team went on to win six Brazilian titles. In 1962 he again played on the World Cup team, but an injury forced him to sit out the contest.

Soccer is a low scoring game, but on November 19, 1969, before a crowd of 100, 000 in Rio di Janeiro, Pele scored his 1, 000th goal. He was not only a high scorer, but a master of ball handling as well. It seemed that the ball was somehow attached to his feet as he moved down the field.

In 1970 Pele again played for Brazil's World Cup team, and in Mexico City they beat Italy for the championship. It was Pele's play, both in scoring and in setting up other goals, that won them the title. When he announced that he would retire from international competition after a game to be played July 18, 1971, plans were made to televise the event throughout the world. He had scored a total of 1, 086 goals. After his retirement he continued to play until he was signed to play for the New York Cosmos of the North American Soccer League for a reported three-year, $7 million contract. A year later New York was at the top of their division, and in 1977 the Cosmos won the league championship. Pele retired for good after that victory, but continued to be active in sports circles, becoming a commentator and promoter of soccer in the United States. When the World Cup came to Detroit in 1994, Pele was there, capturing the hearts of millions of fans around the world. Later that spring, he married his second wife, Assiria Seixas Lemos. In May of 1997, he was elected Minister of Sports in his home country of Brazil.

Further Reading

Two books—Joe Marcus' The World of Pele (1976) and Pele's New World (1977) by Peter Bodo and David Hirshey—provide excellent reading, as well as illustrations. The best book on Pele is by Pele himself—My Life and the Beautiful Game (1977). □

Pelé , 1940–, Brazilian soccer (football) player. His real name is Edson Arantes do Nascimento. Perhaps the greatest player in the history of soccer, Pelé began playing at the age of 5 and joined the Santos team at 16. Playing inside left forward, he led his team to numerous championships and the Brazilian national team to world championships in 1958, 1962, and 1970. He held every scoring record in Brazil, and in international matches he scored an average of one goal per game. His playing style was marked by superb ball control and great tactical ability. In 1971 he retired from the Brazilian national team but continued to play with Santos. He retired (1974) from the Santos team and played in the United States with the New York Cosmos (1975–77). He scored 1,281 goals during his career. Pelé became Brazil's minister of sports in 1995, serving until 1998.

Pele

In Polynesian mythology, Pele is the fire goddess of Hawaii. A powerful and destructive deity, she is said to live in the crater of the volcano of Kilauea on the big island of Hawaii. Perhaps the best-known deity of Hawaii, Pele appears in many myths and legends.

Like many figures in Polynesian mythology, Pele is a great traveler. She came to Hawaii from the island of Tahiti, but the reasons for her trip vary. Some myths say that she fled Tahiti to escape the anger of her older sister, whose husband she had stolen. In other stories, she was driven from Tahiti by a great flood or went to Hawaii simply because she wished to travel.

Pele's arrival in the Hawaiian Islands was accompanied by mighty volcanic eruptions. She visited various islands looking for a place to live, but the sea constantly flooded the sites she chose for a home. She finally found refuge in the volcano of Kilauea.

Once settled in Kilauea, Pele traveled to a neighboring island and fell in love with a young chief named Lohiau. After returning home, Pele sent her young sister Hi'iaka to fetch the chief. She gave Hi'iaka supernatural powers, which the young woman used to overcome various obstacles during the journey.

When Hi'iaka arrived at the home of Lohiau, she found that the young chief had died of a broken heart caused by his longing for Pele. Hi'iaka caught his spirit and used her magical powers to restore him to life. Meanwhile, Pele became impatient, imagining that her sister had stolen Lohiau's love. The enraged Pele sent a stream of lava that killed Hopoe, the dearest friend of Hi'iaka.

deity god or goddess

When Hi'iaka finally brought the young chief to Kilauea, she learned of the death of Hopoe. Grief stricken, she embraced Lohiau, whom she had come to love. Pele saw this and sent more lava to kill Lohiau. Protected by her magical powers, Hi'iaka later restored Lohiau to life again and went to live with him on his home island.

* See Names and Places at the end of this volume for further information.

supernatural related to forces beyond the normal world; magical or miraculous

patron special guardian, protector, or supporter

Many other legends deal with Pele's fiery temper and reveal how unpredictable and dangerous she could be. In some myths, she also appears as a water goddess who caused the seas to encircle the islands of Hawaii. Both Pele and Hi'iaka are considered patrons of magic and sorcery as well as of the hula, the ancient sacred dance of Hawaii.

See also Polynesian Mythology.

Pele An active volcano on Jupiter's satellite Io, at -19° lat., 255° W long. It lies in a volcanic complex about 500 km across, which includes lava flows and tablelands. It was active in 1979March during the Voyager 1 encounter, but had ceased by the time Voyager 2 passed four months later. In 1996 it was seen by the Hubble Space Telescope to generate a plume over 400 km high in the course of a few tens of hours. Vaporized sulphur might be responsible for eruptions of this size, the heat being provided by an intrusion of molten silicate magma.

Pelé (1940– ) Brazilian footballer, b. Edson Arantes do Nascimento. He scored 97 goals in 111 appearances for Brzail. Pelé led Brazil to three World Cup victories (1958, 1962, 1970). He made his last international appearance in 1971. Apart from 1975–77, when he played for the New York Cosmos, all his club games were played for Santos. Pelé scored a total of 1281 goals. In 1997, he became Brazil's minister for sport.

Pele in Hawaiian mythology, the goddess of volcanoes. Pele's hair is the name given to fine threads of volcanic glass, formed when a spray of lava droplets cools rapidly in the air.

Pele , Hawaiian goddess of the volcano. Her traditional home is Halemaumau, the fire pit of Kilauea crater on the island of Hawaii.

pele. See peel.

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