Massive and Weighty
Book: "No Fixed Points. Dance in the 20th Century."
by Nancy Reynolds and Malcolm McCormick
Yale University Press, 2003
and recently reprinted
This book hits readers like a space rock, all 907 pages of it. Its authors, Nancy Reynolds and the late Malcolm McCormack (1927 - 2018) were dancers and have proven themselves to be scholars. My only real objection to the current edition is the difficulty of holding such a thick book in one's hands or even resting it in one's lap. It should have been issued in two or even three volumes.
The authors start the story of 20th Century performance dance by focusing on what was new in 1900, what was causing history's pages to turn. They argue that it was principally body movement as presented by American women - Loie Fuller, Isadora Duncn, Ruth St. Denis, Maud Allan. Their best audiences, though, were European. Other historians you may read ascribe the invention of modern dance to a Frenchman, the singer and actor Francois Delsarte (1811 - 1871) and his American disciples, Steele McKaye and Genevieve Stebbins. Still others nominate Britain's Emma, Lady Hamilton and her embodyments of human figures, way back around 1787. Quite apart from who was really first with modern dance, Reynolds and McCormack's descriptions and analyses give substance to the dance past as it appeared around the world.Reading their book, I realized that what dance needs in addition to fine performers, teachers and choreographers is an interested, knowledgeable audience. Such a public existed in Paris, especially during the 19th Century and in New York City in the 20th Century. Compare those two cities to Vienna. There was no shortage of talent in the latter. Hilverding, an outstanding Viennese ballet master and choreographer, was in charge of the ballet there for quite a while but was loaned to St. Petersburg and Moscow. The great 19th Century ballerina Fanny Elssler toured the world but was at home in Vienna. The choreographer Josef Hassreiter was prolific in Vienna from the end of the 19th Century until about World War 1. In ballrooms, Vienna was known as the city of waltzing. Yet, as audience, the Viennese preferred music and opera. After the end of World War 2, Erika Hanka directed and choreographed for the Vienna Opera's ballet company. Her choreography merges ballet, modern dance and dramatic movement, not unlike Antony Tudor did in his works. Balanchine ballets began to enter Vienna's repertory as did at least one Tudor ballet. What did not exist in Vienna was the rapport between dancers and the public such as prospered in London, Paris, Copenhagen, Petersburg and Moscow. Vienna remained the city of the operathuse.
The book's 17 chapters focus on such events as the merging of classic and new in Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, the expressionist modern dance of Central Europe, ballet and modern dance in America and Russia including Judson Church post-modernism, the international ballet boom that followed World War 2, and also the dancing that filled musicals, movies and television. Surprisinglyand unlike so many AngloAmerican critics, our authors do not belittle French sensualist ballet choreographer Maurice Bejart. Attention is paid to now-neglected choreographer Choo San Goh and his merging of styles. Not mentioned are Mme. Mao and ballets such as "Red Detachment of Women" in Communist China. Of course, the creativity of Balanchine remains a major theme throughout the book.
McCormack, sadly, has died. Reynolds remains active as head of the Balanchine Foundation and as a writer.
copyright 2021 by George Jackson
