Petra

Has anyone seen (or heard) about the Wheeldon ballet? I suppose it only covers Henry's first two wives, as after that he became too fat to be portayed by a ballet dancer.

Isn't there a story that Sol Hurok didn''t want the RB to bring The Two Pigeons to NY in the '60s - he said something like "Do you know what the pigeons do to people sitting on benches in NY?".

I think both Clinton and W would be bipartisan enough to prefer that the role of Odette-Odile were split between two dancers, rather than have to share one girl between the two of them.

Mel, I believe the rationale many actors are giving is "I swear and take my clothes off in all my other movies. I'm doing this one for the kids". I'm just not sure whether they mean they can take their kids to see the Harry Potter movies or whether the Harry Potter movies are paying for their college funds!

Nureyev and Jude (but he's a Nureyev lookalike )

Can someone explain the significance of the cat in Mr. B's biography? :shrug:

This is now off topic - but to continue Nanatchka and Alexandra's insightful comments on the place of art in society, I think part of the problem of ballet today is that the few people who do need to experience art as worship and who are also interested in articulating and investigating that experience (besides those on Ballet Alert) are not 'into' ballet. They are more likely today to be fans of some form of oppular culture and I think the many books and websites connecting philosophy and popular culture - from the Sopranos to Buffy the Vampire Slayer exemplify this. Although even popular culture isn't what it used to be - reality TV (direct communication with God) is fast replacing scripted Tv (filtered through a priest or liason). :shrug:

Alison Uttley's A Traveller in Time - a girl goes back to the time of the first Elizabeth and gets involved in a plot to overthrow Elizabeth and replace her with Mary Queen of Scots. Charlotte Sometimes by Penelope Farmer - Clare goes away to boarding school and changes place for days at a time with Charlotte, who is living in 1917. To a certain extent, E. Nesbit's Story of the Amulet is also about time travel. It's interesting that all these books deal with children who go back in time from the 'present' time of writing while we are in fact far removed from that 'present' time - both chronologically and in spirit. For instance, the protagonist of A Traveller in Time is sent from London to the country for her health!

This board just reads my mind. I am reading 'Living History' and was ridiculously thrilled to find out how important ballet was to the Clinton family. In fact, I meant to post about it after finishing the book. For instance, before declaring his candidacy for President, Bill made sure that he would be available for important events in Chelsea's life (11 at the time, I think) such as the Arkansas Ballet's Nutcracker. Also, when they need 'cheering up', Hillary and Chelsea take a trip to NY to see ABT's Sleeping Beauty.

Maybe Odette is one of the ballerinas who has a gentleman protector and Odile, who is a cancan dancer, is jealous because she can only catch the absinthe addicts. Oh dear, I have been so sad that after spending 9 months in Philly I am going home exactly when this Swan Lake is premiering. I hope I remain sad about it after reading everyone's reviews.

'The Winter of Enchantment' by Victoria Walker is not as well known as some of the books already mentioned, but it is a beautiful and delicate tale of a young boy (English, of course, in the late 19th century, of course) becoming a hero by default. I love this book.

Now I'm really interested, what are your good old Flemish and Dutch classics? I think the only book I've read that was originally written in Dutch is The Diary of Anne Frank

This is a great thread and as always I feel I should be reading the books I haven't read yet, instead of reading the thread, but it's kind of funny because it really shows off the Americentricity (that's not a word, is it?) of this board. Marjolein, I notice you're located in Belgium, and I don't think that everything listed here will be considered a 'great classic' in Belgium, for instance Willa Cather or Mark Twain. Notwithstanding, I'll add some of my own biased choices: the Old Testament esp. Genesis and Alice in Wonderland,

Wasn't there a MacMillan ballet based on Blood Wedding - called "Three sisters", maybe????????? If there is such a ballet and I'm not making it up, then that might be what Iceydeville was referring to.

Ari, as George Bernard Shaw said "England and America are two countries divided by a single language'

At the risk of turning this into a chat - if you major in Archeology, you will probably be required to study an ancient language too.

What is a yockfest?

Totally off topic: :offtopic: BattementCloche, if you are studying WWI at the moment (or just reading some War poetry), I think you would really enjoy Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain. It's an autobiography of a young Englishwoman who was supposed to go up (or is it down?) to Cambridge just when the War broke out. I think it was recently discussed on the board.

This may be off topic, but it's connected to lots of things often discussed here: Is it usual for current principals to coach newbies making their debuts? I'm not at all familiar with the dancers, but with respect to Tamara Rojo, I think that at her age, these coaching sessions will teach her more about the role of Juliet and how she perceives it than they will teach Cuthbertson and Watson. Why don't they bring in Seymour, Sibley, Dowell, PArkinson, etc. to coach the promising newcomers?

BattementCloche, before you run off applying to French universities, a word of caution: as far as I understand it (and Estelle and Juliette must correct me) the style of teaching in French universities is much more 'old-fashioned' than in American ones. Most classes are frontal lectures and are run in an authoritarian style, at least compared to American universities. My husband is in his first year of grad studies here in the US and he says it is quite noticable that the foreigners (except for brash Israelis like himself) are not that used to partiicpating and initiating class room discussion. I think you wrote that you are home-schooled. It would be a big shock to your system to jump into the Old World style of instruction. Imagine learning history like we learn ballet!!!

The POB Nureyev version has been televised - I saw it on Mezzo - with... I can't recall, Monique Loudieres, perhaps??

I think that you can get around the 'memorizing facts problem' by making the subject intersting. Once students are engrossed in the subject, they wouldn't mind spending time in memorizing facts - they would want to have that knowledge at their disposal. This comes up a lot in Israel, both in History and in Bible Studies (both compulsory for matriculation). But then, BAers are strange - I like to know that I can recite David's lament for Jonathon 2 decades after I studied it.

Is James, Henry James? And if so, is it enough to have seen the movies to enjoy the book?

I think that it will be very difficult to reach true diversity in ballet companies without an enormous amount of grass-roots educational work. I am a new 'non-resident alien' in the US and I was very surprised to see the fairly 'white bread' look of the PA Ballet given that the majority of people on the streets of Philly are not white (but then the second time I saw PA Ballet, Riolama Lorenzo and Heidi Cruz danced the lead roles ...) However, this is a general problem in this country. After all, there are not that many people of colour working in an administrative position in the company I work at. Ballet is also at a distinct disadvantage compared to other artforms like acting or music which seem to promise fame and financial gain. So I can understand why parents who 'want the best' for their child and are unfamilar with ballet would be more likely to sedn their child to a sports activity (fame and fortune again) or to a drama class. Mel, I'm not sure that the fact that the girls you talk of were of Arab heritage wasn't relevant to their decision to leave ballet and go into academia. If they or their parents are immigrants, they are more likely to 'want' their achievement, whatever it is, to be tangibly validated. (Believe me, I know - this is the third continent I've immigrated to :shrug: )

I wonder how the POB's income from tickets is divided up between 'regular' ballet-goers and between tourists/corporate, etc. Personally, when I was in Paris 3 years ago, I would have gone to anything being presented by the POB. Of course, I would have preferred to have seen Swan Lake or La Bayadere rather than Nosferatu :shrug: but what could I do, Nosferatu was the only production on at the time. Perhaps management counts on 'drop-ins' more than on 'regulars'. Also, as it is heavily subsidized, the POB can afford to ignore public opinion more than most companies. French posters, are there ever discussions of reducing its subsidy?