Monica Mason on learning to dance the Firebird

When I came to learn it a year or so ago, Michael Somes taught us. And then I said to Norman [Morrice], "I know the role now. I know how to dance the steps and I know what all the steps are. but I just have got to have a link with the past. You've got to get Margo or somebody to come and show us how it felt. You've got to show us what the ballet's about." This is not to knock Michael in any sense at all, but this I felt was the one role where you had to talk to somebody who'd danced it.

Margot had actually been coached by Karsavina, and I knew that Margot held the key for the Firebird because she had got it directly from Karsavina herself. And Margot of course, as always, was so busy and couldn't be reached and wasn't available and then couldn't do it and then she'd be in the building and couldn't stay and all this. But I just couldn't accept the fact that she was not available for half an hour at some point in her life. And eventually once day I appealed to Norman: I said, "You know, I have a feeling that if I can't get some time with Margot, I don't really want to do it, because I can't do it without that." I was passionate about it. And so he had another talk to her. and one day, I suppose literally she gave us about forty-five minutes or an hour. It was wonderful. From the moment she started, I knew that I'd been right -- I had really, really needed her.

She just used some of the words that Karsavina had used for her; what had been conveyed to her had really stayed. And they have stayed, they will stay, with me. On the very first entrance in Firebird, she said, "This is your territory, your domain, and you don't fly over it, you soar. You soar over your territory. Even a sparrow notices if another sparrow comes to perch on his tree, his branch. So imagine what it must be like for the Firebird to have a man invade her territory and actually capture her." And immediately one had a whole different picture. And then she talked about the viciousness of the bird. Apparently, according to Russian folklore, Firebirds actually ate men. She absolutely was a man-eater. So the Prince doesn't really know what he has caught, but the Firebird knows.

And she said that Karsavina had said that from the moment the Prince catches her, she hates him. She hates him for daring even to touch her. Nobody dares to touch her. And another thing Margo said was that when you plead with him to let you go, you still retain this hatred for him, that there's no softening in your feelings. You hate him, and you even hate the fact that you have to ask him to release you. You have to plead, but you plead without losing any of your dignity or your feeling of self-preservation. So all of that stirred one's imagination, which was really what I knew I needed for the role. Those were the things I latched onto and tried to understand. They all make it very fantastical, which the music is.

Striking a Balance: Dancers talk about Dancing by Barbara Newman.1982. Pages 300-1.

Sokolova's memories of Le Spectre de la rose

I enjoyed watching Fokine dance, and I loved to see him with Karasvina in Le Spectre de la rose. It was an entirely different sensation from watching Nijinsky. Nijinsky had been such a myth, and he had that miraculous elevation, so that one was dazzled by his performance and never thought of analysing or criticising it. Fokine danced with a complete understanding of the music and of the steps he had invented to go with it. Nijinsky had been sexless -- an elfin thing. Fokine dancing with Karsavina was very much the lover. When the beautiful Karsavina dance Le Spectre with Nijinsky, she seemed to show a certain detachment, as if he was merely a dream to her, and when he floated out of the window she really woke up. When she danced the same ballet with Fokine there seemed to be a secret affinity between them. I used to say to myself, 'He loves her. I know he does.' When he leaned over her as she slept in her chair and he brushed her forehead with a kiss, just before his exit leap, you could almost hear him think, 'Wake up and remember me.'

Dancing for Diaghilev by Lydia Sokolova. 1960. Pages 52-3.

Peter Martins on Balanchine

Dancers and writers often talk of Balanchine's stress on speed, speed and clarity. But my sense of his true priority, of what he is working for, is different. The word I'd give it is energy. Energy can be fast or slow, but, what Balanchine is demanding is that all parts of the dancing body be energized. There are no dead or resting limbs. Everything is active. Someone can be speedy and quick and still be dead. Speed in itself is not the point, although it is required. In adagio, Balanchine asks for energy that is slow, slow but intense, and full. Whenever you move your arm or your legs, you are saying this is my arm, these are my legs, and I am putting them there.

Far from Denmark by Peter Martins. 1982. Page 91.

Dame Ninette de Valois -- a memory of Nijinsky

After all of us settled into Merle's car, Dame Ninette related one more story from her infinite repertoire. She told us about the first time she saw the famous Nijinsky dance. Her mother had taken her to the theatre, when she was "quite a young girl" -- which meant this took place very early in the century.

"When I first saw him enter," she said, "I hid under my seat on the floor. My mother looked over and asked me, 'What are you doing down there?' I told her, 'I don't like that man!' He seemed more of an animal than a man. . . and he frightened me. . . I liked everyone else on stage, but Nijinsky scared me."

The Shape of Love by Gelsey Kirkland. 1990. Pages 167-8.

The Bow

It was my mother, the former actress, who, years ago, taught me the purpose of the bow was not to bask in praise or milk applause, but to conjure an image of sublime reverence for the theatre.

The Shape of Love by Gelsey Kirkland. 1990. Page 110.

Le Spectre de la Rose

This work, which Karsavina calls "blessed," was meant to be a trifling fill-in ballet, a brief contrast to the other works on the program, and its success took everyone by surprise. It was created spontaneously in two or three rehearsals, in what Karsavina remembers as a blissful mood, and even Diaghilev was calm about the entire production. The only moments of discord occurred when Bakst insisted on including a caged canary in the decor; wherever he hung it, it interfered with the dance--hence expediting its elimination. One fault found in this duet, which helped many audiences further understand and see Fokine's reforms, is that few of the many performers who have since attempted the roles have been able to achieve the fresh, spontaneous, dreamlike quality of Karsavina and Nijinsky. In writing of the poetic dancing of the latter, Fokine laments the apocryphal stories of his final leap and insists that this great artist needs nothing more than the truth told about his portrayal of "a spirit. . . a hope. . . a fragrance that defies description."

Michel Fokine by Dawn Lille Horwitz. 1985. Pages 30-1.

The RSPCA and Pavlova's Ballet Company

Also we often had trouble when we gave the ballet "Don Quixote". The large number of additional artists and supers made it very difficult to stage the ballet on a small scale. Another difficulty was that this ballet required a horse and a donkey. When we gave it for the first time in London the donkey brought to the theatre was a beautiful little animal, but the coffee coloured horse appeared far too smart and wellfed for the part. The matter was put right by an artist-decorator, who happened to be working in the theatre. What he did was very simple; he painted such prominent ribs and gave the horse such a wretched look, that on the day after the performance an inspector of the RSPCA came to the theatre. He showed us a letter received by the Society from some tender-hearted old lady, saying that she had been indignant to see at our performance in what a terrible condition we kept our horse. But when he saw the horse without the make-up, the inspector was completely satisfied. It was only very tiresome that this make-up had to be put on anew at every performance for the horse's owner refused to ride it home in that state.

Anna Pavlova in art and life by Victor Dandre. 1932. Pages117-8.