We travel to ancient Greece to unravel the myth, method and madness of Johan Cruyff’s democracy with an interview with Brilliant Orange author David Winner.
“You play football with your head; your legs are there to help you.”
– Johan Cruyff
One moment he comes this close to insulting his rivals, the next he has them eating out of his hand. Depending on who you believe, he is either an idealist or a schemer. If there’s one thing that every statement would confirm is that he was a lot of things, and he was better at them than most will ever be. You wouldn’t be wrong to think that it’s Johan Cruyff that I’m writing about.
John Berger, one of the leading visionaries on the subject of critical thinking – may he rest in peace – once had his cataract removed. He said, “the removal of cataracts of the eyes is comparable with the removal of a particular kind of forgetfulness…The eyes begin to remember first times (of everything). And the two eyes, again and again, register surprise.” The study of history has a similar prognosis. It teaches us “how images turn to stories and paintings become narratives.” Very few did it better than tender-sounding, everyone’s favourite uncle, John Berger.