About Biographies – Diego Maradona

In Spain it is quite common to read and watch translated works. A movie is often dubbed. That is what I’m thinking of when reading this book.

It is hard to write about this book, about this biographer, about politics and soccer and supporters. Most of all about the soccer game: you are either in favor or against. Barcelona or Madrid, Manchester or Liverpool, or in this case, Argentina or England.

That is what I think will do this book: it divides, those who are in favor of Argentina and Maradona and those who are against him and them.

It is a book with political, social and religious viewpoints. The first chapter is called “Resurrection.” It is also about politics, about the Falkland war in 1982 and it is about soccer. Through this, the image of Maradona is sketched.

In the introduction of this biography the author writes about the time when he slips into a depression, in parallel with what happens to Maradona at that time. The meaning of this revelation is more important than I could have imagined at first. I keep on wondering why does he feel depressed after having finished this biography. Does he realize what he has done? Is that it, I wonder?

The biography has never been authorized by Maradona, but that happens a lot. Nevertheless biographies can be very interesting. This work has been thoroughly prepared yet it is easily digested by those who would wonder, “who is the author of this work, who is Jimmy Burns. What side is he on?”

He turns out to have both English and Spanish roots and that is the first problem. This is linked to the second problem that of linking too much in a single work: politics, social life and religion.

The Argentinean supporter will not accept the result, and Burns is quite frank about it in his introduction.

“In England,” he writes, “people would love it when a foreigner writes about Charles and Diana.” But in Argentina they don’t see it like that. I think they feel betrayed.

The conflict starts right at the beginning, with the subtitle: the hand of God? Or is that the real title. And is “The life of Diego Maradona,” the subtitle? Has the author forgotten about his background when he refers to this goal in Mexico when Argentina played against England?

The fact that Burns has Spanish roots (he is born in Madrid) doesn’t change the fact that the biography is not accepted in South America. Spain is as much a rival as England is for Argentina.

The religious focus makes it also less credible. Soccer and religion form a stable couple, but also an explosive couple. Why is the book structured with religious themes, like “resurrection”, “a child has born,” and “to the temple,” is what I ask myself. The hand of God. From the first sentence we learn the basic premise: this is the story about a player who thought he was god, and suffered as a result of it.”

That explicit message makes one wonder. How could he be so sure? Or let me rephrase this, could it be that he suffered for other reasons. Or when did he become god, when did he start thinking like that?

But these or many other questions do no longer matter; the verdict has been sentenced…

The social, political and religious viewpoint has made the work more provocative and less universal. You either like the ideas or you don’t. You are either on the British side of the Falklands war or on the Argentinean Side of the same Malvinas war. You believe what he writes about the Argentinean culture, about their “hero” Martin Fierro about their language and the role of “deceiving” or you think it is all fiction and you laugh about the so-called “Fair Play” in the UK.

In line with this it is possible that the real content about soccer and the person of Maradona doesn’t get delivered. There is interesting content enough, about Pele and Cruyff and Burns’ his opinion of Maradona’s technical qualities.

But,

And that is my opinion. When it is about the life of Maradona, I would prefer to read not the subtitled “movie” but the real thing, from the field and not from a foreign reporter. To read from a native speaker, or worst case, someone from Uruguay who became an Argentinean citizen. That is why I would prefer “I’m Diego” from Daniel Arcucci and Ernesto Cherquis Bialo. With the risk of being more autobiographical than a biography, but would the conclusion be the same? As a judge, I would give most people the benefit of the doubt.

Not God, just Diego.

H.J.B.

eng.az24saat.org by News