摘要：Soccer is an important cultural practice in Brazil around which many competing and complementary narratives about what it is to be “Brazilian” are created. The mythology of the art of soccer, as object turned expressive through the arts—especially literature and fine arts—is validated in a variety of current discourses. Ginga, cunning (malandragem), and improvisation are marks of this movement, and its origins lie in racial mixing (mestiçagem). The movement’s counterpart would be a narrative that, not highlighting improvisation as a cultural strength, values improvisation according to reason and to the pursuit of a goal only seduced by cleverness (malabarismo), if such goal is achieved. If Gilberto Freyre and Nelson Rodrigues are the main representatives of the first narrative, Decio de Almeida Prado is the great connoisseur of the second.
