E! PLAYTIME! P The games we play and why we play them. BY Eduardo Gutiérrez Peña ILLUSTRATION XingXing Shou DESIGN Isaac McKenna
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he circle comes together when the mestre sounds the berimbau, producing a buzzing sound unlike any other percussion instrument. Para-na-weyyyyy, para-na-wey para-na, by my third capoeira class I had managed the refrains of one of the songs and some basic steps. Our mestre fills in between the students singing, “Parana parana quando eu era menino paraná eu era muito feio paranáaa” (when I was a child I was very ugly). It took me a few lessons to learn that my instructor was, for the most part, improvising; my Portuguese was improving! The atabaque provides the bass to the berimbau’s whiny call, and the game is set. I took classes in Rio and Salvador and found the language around capoeira interesting. “Jogar” is the verb attached to “capoeira,” meaning play. However, the verb takes on a life of its own and “jogar” becomes the stand in for capoeira—a mixture of martial arts and dance. Most capoeira games are just contactless sparring; however, a takedown is still possible in games, and an unexpected kick that stops inches from the head is essentially a checkmate. Play enables us to embody different positions and strategies that would not be available to us any other way. When engaging in play, we agree to logics different from those in day-to-day life, new rules that reflect elements of society (such as chess, cards, and royal hierarchy). In social deduction games like mafia, positions such as trickster, angel, or narrator provide the opportunity for people to shine or perish within these roles. I think of play as an experiment
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in creativity. Most play is relatively inexpensive, yet whenever I engage in more formal creative pursuits, I have always been deterred by the cost. I felt that I needed money to buy pigments to paint or a marble block to sculpt. Discouraged, I continued with writing and running, two activities that were facilitated by my school and had few financial deterrents (a pair of shoes, a pen, paper, and a library card are all you need). While having money could buy me the brush, I would still have to focus on a craft in order to understand the bounds, and to break them. There are rules to writing as well, demonstrated most actively by grammar and punctuation, but those rules are in place as the backbone for expression. In writing, rules are meant to standardize written communication. But rules can also establish boundaries—and from boundaries, play can be made. The sonnet and the haiku have some of the most rigid structures in written language, and yet the challenge of complying with the rules births innovation in imagery: word play. In other ways, however, rules can restrict creativity. Before and during high school, so much of my writing seemed governed by the rules of school. I was taught to analyze novels and poems, but not the process of making books and art. I remember being frustrated in my high school English class because other students had learned grammar and punctuation since elementary school, and I thought my lack of knowledge of the written word made me lesser. Later on, I realized that not all college professors are English professors and learned that I could throw specific punctuation
13 NOV 2020
