WS MoreOrLess: Brazil’s Maths Superstar

Summary

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More or Less: Brazil’s Maths Superstar (May 12, 2014)

Episode Overview

This episode of "More or Less," hosted by Tim Harford, spotlights Brazil’s unexpected mathematical icon: Malba Tahan. With the world’s gaze fixed on Brazil ahead of the World Cup, Harford and guest expert Alex Bellos turn attention away from football and samba to explore the story of one of Brazil’s most beloved literary and mathematical figures—whose own identity is a beguiling riddle.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Scene: Brazil, Maths, and the World Cup

• [00:18] Tim Harford opens the show playfully challenging stereotypes of Brazilian culture, emphasizing that behind football and samba lies a rich, understudied tradition involving maths and storytelling.
  • Quote:
    Tim Harford [00:18]: “It’s not the size of our data set that matters, it’s what we do with it that counts.”

2. Introduction to Malba Tahan and "The Man Who Counted"

• [01:14] Narrator describes early 20th-century Rio de Janeiro, setting the historical and cultural context for Malba Tahan’s popularity.
• The supposed author, an “Arab scholar” named Mauba Tahan, became a literary sensation after publishing morality puzzles in a style resembling the Arabian Nights.
• [02:25] Excerpt from "The Man Who Counted," introducing main character Beremiz Samir, a Persian mathematician protagonist who uses math to unravel mysteries.

3. Blending Math with Storytelling

• [03:35] A highlighted scene where Beremiz uses arithmetic and clever reasoning to count camels for a king’s minister, noting the symbolism of squared numbers and powers of two.
  • Quote:
    Beremiz Samir [03:54]: “If you were to remove from the herd the defective animal, the total would be 256, which is the square of 16... These relations between squared numbers are good auguries for lovers.”
• The book merges gentle, accessible math with enchanting narratives of Bedouins and viziers.

4. The Literary Hoax Unveiled

• [05:28] Renowned author Paulo Coelho recounts his childhood fascination with “the mysterious Arab author” only to discover Malba Tahan was actually a local math teacher.
  • Quote:
    Paulo Coelho [05:28]: “I wish one day I’m going to meet him… And my parents said, no, no, he’s not an Arab. He lives three or four blocks from here.”
• [06:07] The truth emerges: Malba Tahan was the pen name of Júlio César de Mello e Souza, a Brazilian math teacher with a passion for Islamic science and storytelling. Only the newspaper owner knew the real identity behind the pen name.

5. Malba Tahan’s Enduring Cultural Impact

• Júlio César wrote over 100 books—about half on recreational mathematics—and brought Arab, Greek, Chinese, Babylonian, and other stories to Brazilian children and adults.
• Malba Tahan became a beloved national figure, even after his true identity was revealed.
  • Quote:
    Paulo Coelho [07:04]: “Moabatahan, not only for me but for my generation, is an author that taught us about this beautiful Arab culture… because tolerance is always present in these stories.”
• By 1974, Tahan had sold over a million books, and his birthday, May 6, is now celebrated as Brazil’s National Day of Mathematics.

6. Final Reflections and Fun Facts

• Malba Tahan was dubbed “the Brazilian of Arabia” and “the Pele of numbers.”
• Contrary to stereotypes, Tahan found football dull; his passions were math, Islamic culture, and collecting porcelain frogs.
  • Quote:
    Narrator [07:37]: “Maths, Islam and collecting Thai frogs. Now that was a lot more fun.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Tim Harford’s Opening:
  “It’s not the size of our data set that matters, it’s what we do with it that counts.” [00:18]

• Beremiz Samir on Numbers:
  “These relations between squared numbers are good auguries for lovers.” [03:54]

• Paulo Coelho reveals the hoax:
  “I wish one day I’m going to meet him…And my parents said, no, no, he’s not an Arab. He lives three or four blocks from here.” [05:28]

• Coelho on cultural importance:
  “Tolerance is always present in these stories.” [07:04]

• Narrator on Tahan’s interests:
  “Maths, Islam and collecting Thai frogs. Now that was a lot more fun.” [07:37]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:18 – Tim Harford introduces the challenge of finding a Brazil–maths crossover
• 01:14 – Historical and cultural introduction to Malba Tahan’s Rio de Janeiro
• 02:25 – Excerpt from "The Man Who Counted": Meeting the mathematical hero Beremiz Samir
• 03:35 – Beremiz’s mathematical solution with the camels
• 05:28 – Paulo Coelho’s personal story and the reveal of Malba Tahan’s identity
• 06:07 – How the literary hoax worked and its social impact
• 07:37 – Malba Tahan’s legacy and idiosyncrasies

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Summary

“Brazil’s Maths Superstar” delightfully uncovers the story behind Malba Tahan—a fictional Arab mathematician invented by Júlio César de Mello e Souza, who gripped Brazil’s imagination and made math accessible, enchanting, and intertwined with cultural lore. With lively storytelling, the episode makes the case that mathematics is as much a part of Brazil’s heart as football or samba, celebrating the power of narrative to make numbers magical—and championing the quiet subversiveness of a maths teacher who became a national icon.

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Transcript

[Tim Harford]

This is the short edition of More or Less, first broadcast on the BBC World Service.

[BBC Announcer]

Thank you for downloading from the BBC. For details of our complete range of podcasts and our terms of use, go to bbcworldservice.com podcasts

[Tim Harford]

hello, and welcome to More or Less on the BBC World Service. It's not the size of our data set that matters, it's what we do with it that counts. Hi, I'm Tim Harford. The World cup is coming, and all eyes are turning to Brazil, which means that over the next few months, you'll be hearing a lot about football, beaches and samba. You probably won't hear a lot about maths. Now, of course, at More or Less, we're not just going to take that lying down, sipping a caipirinha while listening to the greatest hits of Gilberto Gil. So we turn to the only person we know who's an expert on both Brazil and. And mathematics, Alex Bellos. And we challenged him to find a fantastical tale which combines the two, preferably something to do with the national Day of mathematics that Brazil celebrated last Tuesday. Easy.

[Narrator]

Rio de Janeiro, 1925, and Brazil is on the upper Workers are building the city's landmark Christ the Redeemer statue. Samba and new music is becoming a national craze, and the country's main newspaper, Anoitsch, introduces a new star writer with a story on the front page. Mauba Tahan, or to give him his full name, Ali Yezid Izadim Ibn Salim. Hank Malba Tahan was a Middle Eastern author who wrote in Arabic and was translated into Portuguese for the Brazilian market. His short pieces were morality tales written in the style of the Arabian Nights. They were a huge success, and in 1932, Malbatahan published what would become one of the most successful books ever written in Brazil. O ormi ki Calculava, the Man who Counted. The book is set in the 13th century.

[Story Reader]

In the name of Allah, the most beneficent, the most merciful. I was on the Baghdad road, returning at my camel's slow pace from an excursion to the famous city of Samara on the banks of the Tigris, when I saw a modestly dressed traveler sitting on a rock who. Who looked as if he was recuperating from a voyage.

[Narrator]

The traveler is Beremiz Samir, a Persian mathematician who joins the narrator on a journey that involves dozens of episodes in which he solves problems using his skill with numbers. At one point, he visits the house of the king's minister, the vizier Ibrahim Maluf.

[Story Reader]

We passed through the heavy iron gate and down a narrow corridor into the splendid inner garden of the palace. This garden, laid out with exquisite taste, was shaded by two rows of orange trees. Passing through a variety of richly furnished rooms hung with tapestry fringed in silver thread, we at last reached the rooms of the king's minister, who was reclining on large cushions and conversing two friends.

[Narrator]

Beremese impresses the vizier with an unusual way of counting a herd of camels. He counts the number of hooves and ears and then divides by six. The camels are a gift for the father of the vizier's 16 year old wife to be. But Bermez notices that one is missing an ear.

[Story Reader]

I wanted to make a small suggestion, replied Bermez. If you were to remove from the herd the defective animal, the total would be 256, which is the square of 16. 16 times 16. The gift offered to the father of the delightful aster would then have a mathematical perfection. The number of camels equal to the square of the age of the beloved. The number 256 is an exact power of two, a number held to be symbolic by the ancients, while 257 is a prime number. These relations between squared numbers are good auguries for lovers.

[Narrator]

I love the man who Counted. The book transports you into a magical world of Bedouins, viziers, sheikhs, princes and kings, rangers rich in references to Islamic traditions and locations in the Middle East. The maths is gentle, accessible and drives the stories. It's mostly arithmetic, but there are geometrical puzzles too, and also curiosities like magic squares. The man who Counted rightly became a best seller and turned Malbert Ahan into a household name. A mathematician as famous as Brazil's football stars. His fans ranged from school children to the president of Brazil and include Brazil's most famous author, Paulo Coelho.

[Interviewee]

When I was a child, I was fascinated by the books of a mysterious Arab author called Mobatam. And I asked my family to buy all his books. He's a great storyteller. Then one day I said, oh my God, this is such a fantastic person. I wish one day I'm going to meet him. And I was talking to my parents like this and they said, but we know him. I said, what? How do you know Balba Tah? He's an Arab, he lives in the Middle East. And my parents said, no, no, he's not an Arab. He lives three or four blocks from here.

[Narrator]

The book was a literary hoax. Ma Bataha never existed. He was the pen name of Giulio Serza Gi Melo e Sousa, a maths teacher from Rio de Janeiro who never set foot in the Middle East. He'd had no luck getting his short stories published under his own name, but his love of maths had led him to a fascination with Islamic science. So he decided to write stories about ancient Arabia using the non deplom Malbatahan. And only the proprietor of the newspaper that printed the stories was in on the joke. For several years, no one knew that the famous Arab author was actually a local math teacher whose other passion was collecting porcelain frogs. When eventually Malbertahan was outed as humble Julio Cesar Gimello Esoza, he was famous enough for it not to matter.

[Interviewee]

I went to his house and I saw him and I shook hands. I did not dare to ask him to sign my books because I was totally shy. But Moabatahan, not only for me, but for my generation, is an author that taught us about this beautiful Arab culture. And this is so important today because tolerance is always present in these stories.

[Narrator]

As Malpatahan Meluis Souza wrote more than a hundred books, about half of them recreational maths and most of them set in the Islamic Middle east, although he also wrote stories about rabbis, Greeks, Chinese and Babylonians. Yet despite his love of foreign cultures, he only left Brazil to go to Portugal and Argentina. He died in 1974, by which time he had sold more than a million books in Brazil. The man who Counted remains his most famous, and it's still in print. And he's going to carry on being part of Brazilian culture, since the government decreed that as of last year, his birthday, May 6, is the National Day of mathematics. Malbatahan was called the Brazilian of Arabia and the Pele of numbers. So did this all Brazilian hero like football? Not really. He thought it was a bit boring. Maths, Islam and collecting Thai frogs. Now that was a lot more fun.

[Tim Harford]

Alex Bellos, author of a rather wonderful new book about mathematics, as well as some boring old book about Brazilian football. That's all we have time for today. Please keep your questions and your comments coming. We're at more or lessbc.co.uk and as always, there's further information and a downloadable edition of the show [e-mail] more or less. We'll be back next week. Until then, goodbye.

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