British author Andrew Downie has spent eight years and conducted more than 250 interviews to write a new book on Brazilian football legend Pelé, titled Epic. The biography covers the three-time World Cup winner's career and his life away from the pitch.
Downie said simply: "Pelé prayed with the Pope, had lunch with the Queen, dinner with Andy Warhol and sang with Frank Sinatra." The book reveals secret acts of kindness by Pelé, who died in 2022, and includes never-before-told stories from family and friends showing his love of the game.
Hidden generosity and secret deals
Downie described how Pelé, during his time with the New York Cosmos, would wander through Central Park and join children playing football. "The most famous footballer in the world playing a game in the park — but he loved it," he said.
Downie, 59, from Granton, Edinburgh, found many people Pelé helped. "He really was so generous and he did it all under the radar," Downie said. "He helped so many people — family, friends and charities and he did the vast majority of it without anyone finding out. He didn't seek publicity and he didn't want publicity." The author also uncovered secret financial deals between Pelé and FIFA boss João Havelange.
A national touchstone
Downie, a Hibs fan now living in Madrid, described Pelé as a national touchstone. "Pelé was a national touchstone, an avatar for the successful, forward-looking country that Brazil wanted to be," he said. "He was its Atatürk, Churchill, or Mandela, and he enjoyed the same reverence."
Downie said he was compelled to write the book because he believed many tales told by Pelé and his friends had been heavily edited or made up. "Pelé produced four autobiographies over a 53 year period and all four of his ghostwriters faced the same problem," he noted. "There were juicy stories to tell but few people willing to tell them."
Matches against English teams
The book includes stories of Pelé's games for Santos against English teams. He played against Chelsea in Jamaica in 1971 and against Newcastle in Hong Kong a year later. In England, he faced Plymouth Argyle, Sheffield Wednesday, Stoke City, Aston Villa and Fulham.
On the debate over the greatest player ever, Downie said: "The opening argument is that Pelé was the pinnacle because he was so far ahead of the game — the only man to win three World Cups and to score 1,000 goals, and the first to become football's global superstar."
Downie also recounted that in November 2023, two days after Messi won his eighth Ballon d'Or, an Italian reporter asked Pope Francis whether he preferred Messi or Maradona. The Pope replied: "I would add a third. Pelé. Maradona was great but he failed as a man. Messi is a gentleman, always correct. But for me, of those three, the real man was Pelé, a man of great humanity."
Pelé died at age 82 on December 29, 2022, at the Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital in São Paulo, with the cause of death being multiple organ failure. He was buried at the Memorial Necropole Ecumenica in Santos. Approximately 230,000 fans passed by his open casket during a 24-hour wake at the Urbano Caldeira stadium. Born in 1940 as Edson Arantes do Nascimento, he began playing for Santos at 15 and for Brazil at 16, winning World Cups in 1958, 1962 and 1970, becoming the only player to do so and the youngest World Cup winner at 17.
