Journalist and writer, born in San Zenone Po, Lombardy, N Italy. In the post-war years he started writing for the sports daily La Gazzetta dello Sport, then worked for other major papers. He succeeded in inventing a new language for sports journalism (Addio bicicletta, 1964; Storia critica del calcio italiano, 1975). He also wrote novels set in the Po valley, characterized by ripe, full-bodied language, including Il corpo della ragassa (1969) and Il mio vescovo e le animalesse (1984).
Gianni Brera (September 8, 1919 - December 19, 1992) was an Italian sports journalist and novel writer.
Biography
Brera was born in San Zenone al Po, near Pavia.
When he was demobilized in 1945, he entered La Gazzetta dello Sport (Italy's first and foremost sports daily) to become its Editor-in-Chief in 1949, the youngest-ever Editor-in-Chief of a national newspaper in Italy.
He is credited with innovating the Italian language, notably by creating a whole new vocabulary for football (soccer), some of which has spilt over into other languages than Italian. The word libero for a player's particular role was created by Gianni Brera: famous nicknames of Italian players created by him included Abatino ("Little Abbot") for Gianni Rivera and Rombo di tuono ("Thunder Rumble") for Gigi Riva.
Gianni Brera wrote in La Gazzetta dello Sport, Il Guerin Sportivo, Il Giorno, Il Giornale, La Repubblica and several other publications.
Gianni Brera always took the point of view of a Northern Italian, more precisely that of a Lombard.
He is considered to have been the most influential Italian sports journalist of the 20th Century.
Brera died at Codogno, near Lodi, in 1992, because of a car accident (he was not the driver of the car).
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