[ePub] The Beggar's Opera by John Gay at Arts-Photography

Description

At eighty-seven; Patricia Wilde remains a grande dame of the ballet world. As a young star she toured America in the company of the Ballet Russe. In her heyday in the 1950s and rsquo;60s; she was a first-generation member and principal dancer of New York City Ballet during the uniquely dramatic Balanchine eramdash;the golden age of the company and its hugely gifted; influential; exploitative; and dictatorial director. In Wilde Times; Joel Lobenthal brings the world of Wilde and Balanchine; of Tanaquil Le Clercq; Diana Adams; Suzanne Farrell; Maria Tallchief; and many others thrillingly to life. With unfettered access to Wilde and her family; friends; and colleagues; Lobenthal takes the reader backstage to some of the greatest ballet triumphs of the modern eramdash;and some of the greatest tragedies. Through it all Patricia Wilde emerges as a figure of towering strength; grace; and grit. Wilde Times is the first biography of this seminal figure in American dance; written with the cooperation of the star; but wide-ranging in its use of sources to tell the full and intertwining stories of the development of Wilde; of Balanchine; and of American national ballet at its peak in the twentieth century.