Pelé Was a Genius at More Than Soccer
The king of futebol was not an easy man to know—but he could be generous in unexpected ways.
The first time I met Pelé, I, like most mortals, had no real idea what to say. An American publisher had hired me to help him write a book for the 2014 World Cup, which Brazil was hosting, but they didn’t want just another traditional soccer memoir recounting long-ago goals and other glories. (Pelé had already published two such books in English–the first in 1977, the year he retired from the New York Cosmos and also, coincidentally, the year I was born.) So when we sat down at his office in Santos, surrounded by aging photos and trophies, I decided to try a different, more personal...
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