Choreography and Narrative: Ballets Staging of Story and Desire [Hardcover]

Susan Leigh Foster (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1996

'This complex and beautifully written investigation of ballet's development in France from the early 18th through the late 19th century extends Foster's earlier efforts to link dance theory and practice...This work is a landmark in the field' - S. E. Friedler, "Choice". 'Invents a new method for writing the history of performance: Foster has found an innovative way of appealing directly to the kinesthetic imagination of her readers, evoking the elusive styles of the pieces she reconstructs' - Joseph Roach, Yale University.'An impressive work of scholarship, this elegantly staged study...uses the concept of a culturally constructed, historically specific body to cut across disciplinary boundaries such as those of medical history, physical education, the practices of fashion, etiquette and comportment, and the science and art of representing the passions in order to elucidate pervasive values toward the body and the changes in these values over time' - Carolyn M. Mulac, "Library Journal".Susan Foster traces the development of the story ballet from the pantomimes of early eighteenth-century theatres through the Revolutionary fetes to the well-known romantic ballets La Sylphide and Giselle. She examines changing conceptions of the dancing body as ballet separated from opera and emerged as an autonomous art form during this turbulent period in French history. Approaching choreography as theory, she shows how choreographic choices are integral to the construction of bodily, individual, gendered, and social identities.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

An impressive work of scholarship, this elegantly staged study by the author of Reading Dancing: Bodies and Subjects in Contemporary Dance (Univ. of California, 1986) "uses the concept of a culturally constructed, historically specific body to cut across disciplinary boundaries such as those of medical history, physical education, the practices of fashion, etiquette and comportment, and the science and art of representing the passions in order to elucidate pervasive values toward the body and the changes in these values over time." Using 18th-century Paris as a focal point, Foster casts her eye over the dance conventions and innovations of that time through early 19th-century romanticism. Descriptions and analyses of specific ballets are offered as interludes between the main chapters of the study. Copious notes and a formidable bibliography of general and primary sources complete the presentation. Not for the casual dance fan, this weighty tome will find a home in academic dance and performing arts collections.?Carolyn M. Mulac, Chicago
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"This complex and beautifully written investigation of ballet's development in France from the early 18th through the late 19th century extends Foster's earlier efforts to link dance theory and practice (see Reading Dancing: Bodies and Subjects in Contemporary American Dance, CH, Apr'87; Choreographing History, 1995; and Corporealities, CH, Jun'96). Foster (Univ. of California at Riverside) has become increasingly adept at presenting historical, physical, and theoretical dancing bodies in relation to one another via written texts. This volume situates ballet as a cultural practice and analyzes its progress in relation to economic, political, and social developments—tracing its evolution through specific danced narratives and emphasizing class, gender, and racial identities. Each of the five chapters focuses on an issue relevant to choreography and training. These are augmented by interludes, which contextualize the theoretical issues. Foster's word images awaken the reader to his/her own physicality and to the connections between an individual's lived experience and history. In previous works Foster has moved in this direction; here she negotiates the gap between theory and the actual body with increasing ease and depth. Illustrations are ample and well chosen throughout; the text is supported and enlarged by numerous notes and an extensive bibliography. This work is a landmark in the field and belongs in all libraries serving undergraduate, graduate, and faculty researchers in dance." —S. E. Friedler, Swarthmore College, Choice, April 1997

(S. E. Friedler, Swarthmore College Choice 1997) --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 392 pages
• Publisher: Indiana University Press (November 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0253330815
• ISBN-13: 978-0253330819
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 7.2 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,110,790 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #71 in Books > Arts & Photography > Performing Arts > Dance > Choreography

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