The Globe and Mail - 24.10.2019

THURSDAY,OCTOBER24,2019 | THEGLOBEANDMAILO OBITUARIES B21

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G

eorge Brancato may have
cemented his legacy as a gi-
ant in Ottawa sports when
he coached the Rough Riders to
their last ever Grey Cup title, but
another football legend remem-
bers Mr. Brancato’s aptitude for
teaching the game from way back
in his playing days.
When Russ Jackson first ar-
rived in Ottawa in 1958 – well be-
fore emerging as one of the great-
est CFL quarterbacks of all time –
it was Mr. Brancato who taught
him how to play the other side of
the ball as a defensive back.
“George, along with Gary
Schreider, taught me a lot about
the position because in those
days you only had two coaches:
Frank Clair was the offensive
coach and Bill Smith was the de-
fensive coach,” Mr. Jackson re-
called. “So you didn’t have a lot of
time with the coaches to learn the
necessary attributes you had to
have to play defensive back.
“I learned a lot from George
when I was there that first year in
’58. He was experienced at the po-
sition, played it well and was will-
ing to share with me as a young
rookie.”
Mr. Brancato, who won Grey
Cups with the Rough Riders as a
player, assistant coach and head
coach, has died at the age of 88.
The Redblacks, the current CFL
team in Ottawa, confirmed his
death Wednesday.
A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Mr.
Brancato was a halfback/defen-
sive back with Ottawa from 1957-

62. The former LSU star earned
    his first Grey Cup as a player with
    the Riders in 1960 on a team that
    included Mr. Jackson and Mr.
    Schreider.
    Mr. Brancato was undersized,
    at least by football standards, at 5
    foot 7 and 177 pounds. Mr. Jack-
    son said what Mr. Brancato lacked

in size, he made up for with

smarts.

“Being tough is fine, but if

you’re too small, you’re going to

get the heck knocked out of you.

You’ve got to be smart, too, and I

think George had that attribute,”

he said.

“He never complained when

he got bumped around and was

always willing to go back out

there on the field and do his job.”

Mr. Brancato’s mind for foot-

ball transitioned naturally to

coaching, and he claimed a sec-

ond Grey Cup title in 1973 as an as-

sistant coach with the club.

He took over as Ottawa’s head

coach in 1974, when Jack Gotta

left the CFL team for Birmingham

of the now-defunct World Foot-

ball League. After capturing the

Annis Stukus Trophy as the CFL’s

top coach in 1975, Mr. Brancato

guided the Riders to a 23-20 Grey

Cup win over Saskatchewan in

1976 in Toronto.

Tight end Tony Gabriel ce-

mented the victory for Ottawa

with a 24-yard TD grab late in the

fourth quarter from quarterback

Tom Clements, a play affection-

ately dubbed “the Catch.”

Mr. Brancato and the Riders

narrowly missed registering the

biggest upset in Grey Cup history

five years later. After finishing the

regular season with a 5-11 record,

Ottawa surged to a 20-1 halftime

lead over the heavily favoured Ed-

monton Eskimos (14-4-1).

But the Eskimos, with Hall of

Fame quarterback Warren Moon,

rallied for the 26-23 victory at

Montreal’s Olympic Stadium.

Kicker Dave Cutler’s 27-yard field

goal late in the fourth quarter

provided Edmonton with the

fourth of its five straight CFL titles

(1978-82).

Mr. Brancato was fired after the

’84 season after the Riders posted

a 4-12 record. He compiled an 82-

90-4 regular-season record with

the Riders, finishing behind only

Mr. Clair (116) in victories.

Mr. Brancato’s teams were 8-10

in the playoffs.

It was during his CFL coaching

tenure that Mr. Brancato earned

the nickname “the Ice Man,” be-

cause he routinely chewed ice on

the sidelines.

Mr. Brancato returned to

coaching in 1989 with the Arena

Football League’s Chicago Bruis-

ers.

“Maybe,” he told The Globe

and Mail, “I didn’t really appre-

ciate the CFL the whole time I was

coaching in it. Now, I can tell you

that it really is a major-league

thing. I’d like very much to be

back in it coaching. I’d be lying if I

didn’t say it was a lot better than

what I’m doing now.”

After the franchise folded, he

served as an assistant with the

Dallas Texans.

He rejoined the Riders in 1993

as a special-teams and secondary

coach on Ron Smeltzer’s staff.

The following year he was an of-

fensive co-ordinator with the ex-

pansion Shreveport Pirates.

Mr. Brancato was also an assist-

ant coach with Saskatchewan

(1985-86). He finished his coach-

ing career in the AFL with Ana-

heim and Florida, retiring after

the ’99 campaign.

Mr. Brancato played both of-

fence and defence, spending time

in the NFL with the Chicago Car-

dinals (1954-55). He made his CFL

debut as a running back with the

Montreal Alouettes in 1956 and

played mostly on defence with

Ottawa but still made appearanc-

es on the offensive side of the ball.

“He was always there, always

ready to play, and never had any

qualms if he had one of the

toughest receivers on his side and

had to cover him,” Mr. Jackson

said.

Mr. Brancato was a CFL All-Star

in 1961 and was inducted into the

Ottawa Sports Hall of Fame in

2002.

THE CANADIAN PRESS

GEORGEBRANCATO

ATHLETE,COACH,88

FORMERROUGHRIDERSCOACH

CREATEDWINNINGLEGACYINOTTAWA

TheBrooklynnative,dubbed‘theIceMan’becauseofhissidelinesnackinghabits,wonGreyCupsasaplayerandbenchboss

CURTISWITHERSOTTAWA

GeorgeBrancatobecameOttawa’sheadcoachin1974.AftercapturingtheAnnisStukusTrophyastopcoach

in1975,heguidedtheRoughRiderstoaGreyCupwinoverSaskatchewanin1976.THE CANADIAN PRESS

S

ara Danius, who was the first
woman to lead the Swedish
Academy, which awards the
Nobel Prize in literature, and who
was ousted in the aftermath of a
sexual-abuse and harassment
scandal that roiled the academy,
died on Oct. 12 in Stockholm. She
was 57.
Her mother, the author Anna
Wahlgren, said on Facebook that
Ms. Danius died of breast cancer,
which was diagnosed six years
ago.
Ms. Danius, a literary scholar,
professor and writer, was the per-
manent secretary of the academy
from 2015 to 2018. As such, she
played a central role in the hotly
debated decision in 2016 to be-
stow the world’s most prestigious
award for literature on a musician

• Bob Dylan.
  But a sex scandal the next year,
  when 18 women accused a board
  member’s husband of sexual as-
  sault, overshadowed the Dylan
  dust-up and led to Ms. Danius’s
  departure.
  She herself was never accused
  of wrongdoing. But she was the
  public face of a global institution
  whose reputation had been se-
  verely damaged.
  Behind the scenes, her enemies
  within the academy sought to
  protect the accused man. They re-
  sisted her attempts to bring in law
  enforcement and forced her out.
  When she left, she acknowl-
  edged that her colleagues had lost
  confidence in her leadership. She
  also defiantly suggested that arro-
  gant and anachronistic forces
  within the academy had invoked
  the institution’s traditions to

deny accountability.

“Not all traditions are worth

preserving,” she said.

Her abrupt departure infuriat-

ed many women – and many men

as well – across Sweden, a country

that prides itself on gender equal-

ity. She was widely viewed as a

scapegoat.

As a New York Times headline

put it: In Nobel Scandal, a Man is

Accused of Sexual Misconduct. A

Woman Takes the Fall.

Thousands of people rallied to

support her in public demonstra-

tions and on social media. In a

show of solidarity, many donned

a garment favoured by the fash-

ion-conscious Ms. Danius – the

pussy-bow blouse, or knytblus, in

which a flowing wide tie is knot-

ted at the neck.

The scandal, driven in part by

the #MeToo movement sweeping

the United States, set off recrimi-

nations and power struggles with-

in the academy. Amid the turmoil,

several of the 18 board members

left their chairs. And in 2018, for

the first time since the Second

World War, no Nobel Prize in liter-

ature was awarded.

The literature prize has a long

history of controversy. The acade-

my has tended to favour Europe-

ans, often Swedes and especially

men, and has frequently hon-

oured obscure writers rather than

towering literary figures.

In 2016, it drew plenty of fire for

awarding the literature prize to

Mr. Dylan, the first time a song-

writer was so honoured. Ms. Dani-

us was pivotal in that selection,

but the deliberations that lead to

the selection of recipients are

kept secret for 50 years, and she

revealed little about it in her book

On Bob Dylan.

When she announced the

award, she cited Mr. Dylan “for

having created new poetic expres-

sions within the great American

song tradition.”

The award horrified many in

the literary world, who main-

tained that song lyrics were not lit-

erature.

Ms. Danius defended the

choice, telling reporters, “He’s a

great poet in the great English tra-

dition, stretching from Milton and

Blake onwards.” Mr. Dylan

worked in the oral tradition, she

added, like Homer and Sappho,

whose works were meant to be

performed, often with instru-

ments, and whose art has sur-

vived well on the printed page.

Sara Danius was born on April

5, 1962, in Taby, north of Stock-

holm. As a child she moved fre-

quently with her mother, Ms.

Wahlgren, who had nine children,

of whom Sara was the oldest.

When Sara was 11, she moved to

Taby to live with her father, Lars

Danius, a teacher and author.

She studied at Stockholm Uni-

versity and, after graduating in

1986, established herself as a liter-

ary critic. After further studies in

France, England and the United

States, she was appointed profes-

sor of aesthetics at Sodertorn Uni-

versity in Stockholm. In 2013, she

was named professor of literature

at Stockholm University.

She married Stefan Jonsson, an

author, in 1989; the marriage end-

ed in divorce in 2010. In addition

to her mother, she leaves her son,

Leo; six of her seven sisters; and

one brother.

Ms. Danius was installed at the

Swedish Academy in 2013 and be-

came permanent secretary in

June, 2015. After stepping down

from that position, she retained

her seat in the academy until she

resigned in February, 2019.

The man at the centre of the

sex scandal, Jean-Claude Arnault,

was found guilty last year of rap-

ing a woman in 2011 and was sen-

tenced to two years in jail; he ap-

pealed, but the appeals court

found him guilty of raping the

same woman twice and extended

his sentence.

In addition, his wife, Katarina

Frostenson, a poet who resigned

from the academy, was accused of

leaking the names of prize recip-

ients to him on at least seven oc-

casions so their friends could

profit from bets. The two have de-

nied all charges and said they

were the objects of a witch hunt.

The academy underwent ex-

tensive restructuring after the

scandal. This year, it named two

Nobel laureates in literature – the

Austrian writer Peter Handke and

the Polish novelist Olga Tokarc-

zuk – to make up for the absence

of the award in 2018.

Mr. Handke’s selection drew

fresh outrage: In 2006, he had eu-

logized Slobodan Milosevic, the

former leader of Yugoslavia who

was on trial for war crimes.

Ms. Danius left the academy be-

fore the decision was announced

to award two literature prizes at

the 2019 ceremony. But she told

reporters she disagreed with the

decision. She suggested that the

year 2018 should have been left

blank, without a recipient – “out

of respect,” she said, “for the

women who became victims.”

NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE

SARADANIUS

LITERARYCRITIC,57

KATHARINEQ.SEELYE

SaraDanius,seenin2017,disagreedwiththedecisiontoawardtwo

NobelPrizesinliteraturein2019.Shesaid2018shouldhavebeenleft

blank,‘outofrespectforthewomenwhobecamevictims’inthe

sex-abusescandalthatroiledtheacademy.JONAS EKSTROMER/REUTERS

HeadofNobelliteraturecommitteewasseenasscapegoatforsexual-abusescandal