(UNICAMP - 2003- 2 fase - Questo 18)THE BEAUTIFUL

(UNICAMP - 2003 - 2 fase - Questão 18)

THE BEAUTIFUL ANTHEM
Win or lose, Brazil has the best tune

Try to be in front of your television by 7.20am

tomorrow to catch another of Brazil's great gifts

to human happiness. With France gone, Brazil

now possesses the best national anthem left in

the 2002 World Cup. First penned by Francisco

da Silva in 1841, the Hino Nacional is arguably

the jauntiest, cheeriest, most tuneful and most

beguiling national anthem on the planet. It feels

as if it comes ready composed from the opera

house, and the influence of Rossini is hard to

miss, though scholars now think Da Silva may

have cribbed the tune from a religious work by

his teacher, José Nunes Garcia. Admirers have

included the Creole composer Louis Moreau

Gottschalk, who wrote a set of variations for

piano and orchestra on it that are well worth

hearing.

 

In his book Futebol: the Brazilian Way of Life, our

South America correspondent, Alex Bellos, explains

how the Englishman Charles Miller first brought

football to Brazil. But by the time Miller arrived

at Santos in 1894, the Hino Nacional had long

expressed in song what Pele and his successors

later expressed so wonderfully on the field.

While the Marseillaise makes bellicose calls to

arms, the Hino Nacional stirs national feelings

by appeals to Brazil's "pure beauteous skies", its

"sound of the sea" and the flowers of its "fair

smiling fields". A natural setting for the beautiful game.

 

When Rivaldo and Ronaldo put another two

goals past Belgium on Monday, thus setting up

tomorrow's quarter-final with England, the

London Evening Standard led its later editions

with a huge one-word headline. It said simply:

BRAZIL! Quite a tribute. It is hard to imagine

any other country whose mere name could be

used in such a way with such confidence, in the

certainty that the readers would react with

pleasure and excitement. Were England to be

playing Argentina, Germany, France or Italy

tomorrow, expectation would be mixed with

fear. To play Brazil, on the other hand, is

simply a delight and an honour.

O artigo acima, publicado no jornal britânico The Guardian, no dia 20 de julho de 2002, tem como tema o Brasil.

 

a) O que o texto enaltece a respeito de nosso país?

b) Por que o The Guardian julgou pertinente publicar esse artigo nessa data específica?

c) Caso o resultado do jogo Brasil x Bélgica tivesse sido outro, como teriam se sentido os torcedores ingleses? Por quê?