While reading some commentary about Joan Acocella's review of Nureyev: The Life, I came across this (older) link to a blog post that muses on Nureyev's ability to "pause" in mid-air, and its similarity to a catch made by Boston Red Sox Center Fielder Coco Crisp.
This Saturday, October 6, at 3PM, the New York Public Library will host the program, "Nureyev and Shakespeare: Julie Kavanagh in Conversation with Robert Greskovic." (Greskovic, of course, is the noted Wall Street Journal ballet critic who commented that Roger Urban's shots were "the most clear in-performance photographs of Nureyev I have seen to date.")
The NYPL says that the free event "will feature screened excerpts of Nureyev in ballets of works adapted from Shakespeare."
The event will be held at the Bruno Walter Auditorium, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-7498.
Part of John Carey's recent review of Julie Kavanagh's Nureyev: The Life for The Times has sparked a tiny tempest. In struggling to explain why he found Kavanagh's book wanting, Carey writes the following:
It should be a joy to read. So why is it not? The fault lies in [Kavanagh's] subject. Describing ballet in words comes down, essentially, to long, precise accounts of where people put their arms and legs, and this has severe limitations as reading matter. Further, ballet is mindless compared to other arts – as mindless as, say, football – and this restricts what can be written about it. Despite its fusillade of detail and its grand narrative sweep, Kavanagh’s book does not contain, in all its 800 pages, a single idea – not, that is, a single new or interesting thought about the physical or metaphysical universe. It is impossible to imagine the biography of a novelist or a painter or a scientist about which this could be said. But with ballet it is difficult to avoid, and the consequence is, intellectually, a howling wilderness, swept by gales of trivia, scandal and society gossip.Writer and reviewer John Appleyard posted this on his blog in response:
John Carey says a very odd thing in his review of a biography of Rudolph Nureyev - 'Ballet is mindless compared to other arts - as mindless as, say, football - and this restricts what can be written about it.' It's odd because I don't know what he means by 'mindless'. A great deal of mind goes into football and an incredible amount, some of it quite lucid, can be written about it. Much more mind would seem to go into ballet and much more can be written, most of it very lucid, about it. Perhaps he means ballet provides a more visceral hit than most arts. But that isn't true either. All art has to be, to some extent, visceral to work at all. Perhaps he means ballet is very abstract. But some is and some isn't and, anyway, abstraction is easily written about. I give up. Can somebody tell me what Carey is on about?To argue that ballet does not require an extraordinary amount of mental effort and constant analysis of technique and performance to achieve even a rudimentary level of proficiency (let alone world-class status) seems like a foolhardy proposition. So let's assume Carey doesn't mean that.
Kavanagh’s book does not contain, in all its 800 pages, a single idea – not, that is, a single new or interesting thought about the physical or metaphysical universe. It is impossible to imagine the biography of a novelist or a painter or a scientist about which this could be said.Not to defend Kavanagh's writing (I haven't read her book, yet), but is not the idea that Nureyev's life embodies—the idea that excellence and transcendence can only be achieved through total devotion to one's art, despite the consequences to one's personality and personal relationships—an interesting thought? It worked for Faust.
It seems to me, for example, that there was a connection between Nureyev’s lack of moral feeling and the general unintelligence of his work—both his performances and his productions. And just as he had an entourage of yes-men, or yes-women, standing between him and the world, so there was a huge cliché machine surrounding him, an endless flow of effusions about how he was a lion, a tiger, a wild thing. Nureyev, and the “Nureyev phenomenon,” did not appeal to our higher instincts.Acocella, at least, seems to confine the "mindless" judgments to the work of Nureyev alone, and not to all ballet.
There has been a pile of coverage—and excerpts—about Julie Kavanagh's Nureyev: The Life. Here's a lengthy rundown:
Excerpts:
Kavanagh never apologises for him, nor does she try to extenuate his frequently brutal behaviour. What she makes clear is that these were flaws in a titanic human being who never ceased to strain every fibre of his being to serve dance. For him there was never any comfort zone. To be a dancer, he said, was "sacrificial work". Kavanagh's book, apart from its comprehensive and compulsively readable account of Nureyev's life and art, and its exceptional lucidity about the history and technique of dance, is an important wake-up call to the lily-livered rest of us: this is what performing can be, but only if we give it everything. Nothing less will do.
Reading this wonderful extensive review that seemingly tells as much about Nureyev that any normal person would want or need to know, I can't see any reason to read the book...With all the coverage, we may be in some Nureyev: The Life overload.
We're finding out more and more about the documentary, "Nureyev: The Russian Years," every minute.
First, the documentary's producer, John Bridcut, stopped by our blog to clear up the confusion over the PBS/BBC versions of this project:
As the producer of the Nureyev documentary, I should make clear that the BBC, which commissioned the film in the first place, decided to use the title "NUREYEV: From Russia with Love". It will be screened on BBC2 on September 29th in the UK, and on the BBC HD channel. PBS is broadcasting a slightly shorter version of the film (six minutes is the difference), and elected to call it "NUREYEV: The Russian Years". Broadcasters often choose different titles, according to what they believe will resonate with their particular audiences.
Much of this early footage was shot by Teja Kremke, an East German ballet student who became Nureyev’s lover when they were both young. (Julie Kavanagh, whose exhaustive biography, "Nureyev: The Life," will be published by Pantheon next month, tracked it down, and served as consultant to Bridcut’s project.)
The earliest known film of Nureyev dancing was made at a student competition in Moscow in 1958. At 20, dressed only in white harem pants, a gold headband and regulation soft slippers, he tears off a solo from “Le Corsaire.” The leaps and spins come thick and fast, embellished with Arabian Nights flourishes that go well with his Tatar allure. Yet the most seductive moment of the dance comes between the circus tricks, with a little nothing of a step called pas balancé. A sweep of the leg here, an echoing sweep of the arm there, and repeat, to the other side — that was all, then straight into the next cyclone of a pirouette. But that throwaway transition was Nureyev’s invitation to join him in his private world of fantasy. Technically, the narrator of the Bridcut film points out, Nureyev’s performance at the competition was “far from perfect.” But already the imprint of his personality was unmistakable.
PBS's Great Performances series will detail the very beginning of Rudolf Nureyev's career in "Nureyev: The Russian Years," which begins airing on August 29. We first spotted news of it at the Arts and Dance blog of Laura Bleiberg at the Orange County Register. See more at the New Yorker's web site, which notes that
... in the old performance footage, some of it never released before, we can see the beginnings of his very individual style, notably the hyperstretched torso. (This was considered effeminate when he introduced it. Now it is standard.)
... The program also ... makes his defection as exciting as a police drama.
Rudolf Nureyev lied about his life so often, to so many people, that any responsible biographer or documentarian must virtually cross-examine every living source to separate his extravagant fictions from bottom-line certainties.No matter how one may feel about Nureyev the man, however, Segal does wrap up with writer-producer John Bridcut's observation about Nureyev's enduring ability to captivate and inspire people:
During his phone interview, Bridcut recalled that a lot of people working on "Nureyev: The Russian Years" approached him, "people who had no interest in ballet at all, like those who helped me edit the film and handled the sound, that sort of thing. And they said they were completely captivated by this man, particularly by that footage of him dancing in Moscow in 1958 [age 20], the first footage there is of him.
"They thought ballet meant nothing to them, and suddenly they were spellbound by him. And this is what all the people who saw him in the flesh still say. I found this really interesting -- that even now he remains a door into the world of ballet for people who are not otherwise drawn to it."
Three new books on Rudolf Nureyev will make 2007 a special year for commemorating the ballet great: Nureyev: The Life, a biography by Julie Kavanagh; an English translation of Trail of a Comet, choreographer Rudi van Dantzig’s book of reminiscences about Nureyev; and Life Behind the Metaphor, a book of rare photographs of Nureyev.
One year shy of his 70th birthday, the late ballet legend Rudolf Nureyev is set to be celebrated with a serendipitous occurrence: The publication of three major, complementary books on his life and art. Julie Kavanagh puts forth a comprehensive, 750-plus-page biography of the dancer in Nureyev: The Life. Famed choreographer and dance director Rudi van Dantzig shares personal reminiscences of his friend in Trail of a Comet, the first English translation of his book Het Spoor van Een Komeet. And photographer Roger Urban presents to the public for the first time his collection of photographs of Nureyev in performance and behind the scenes with Life Behind the Metaphor, a book of 80 black-and-white photographs taken during Nureyev’s 1978 tour of the United States. While Nureyev: The Life and Trail of a Comet tell the story of Nureyev’s legacy, Life Behind the Metaphor shows the great dancer in all his glory, in photographs that ballet lovers have never seen before.
The fortunate timing of these three very different titles should give ballet aficionados plenty to chew on. From Kavanagh, devotees will find a broad and deep look at Nureyev’s life and art, and from van Dantzig, an intimate look at the man who was his friend and artistic collaborator. But fans of Rudolf Nureyev will be particularly delighted with Life Behind the Metaphor, a previously unseen glimpse of his fantastic physical feats while in performance and his intensity, dedication, and humor backstage, preserved in a collection of 80 rare black-and-white photographs.
Life Behind the Metaphor will be available in October 2007 online at www.nureyevlegacy.org, and at select museum shops and art booksellers.
