Читать книгу The Art of Ballet онлайн

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This much said, before setting out to travel the road of the past, let us for a moment reconsider another fact, namely, that we have in London two theatres where for about a quarter of a century Ballet was the main attraction. The fact is unique in the annals of the British stage.

Ballets have been produced elsewhere occasionally. We have seen operas, pantomimes, burlesques, of which they formed a part. At earlier periods—as in the ’forties of last century—they have also been seen as separate items in the programme of an operatic season; and there has been a quite remarkable revival of interest during the past few years. But in all the history of the stage there was never before a time when it could be said that for such a period not one but two theatrical houses in London continuously offered this kind of entertainment as their chief attraction.

It has to be remembered that this sustained existence of Ballet in England has been, as in the case of all “legitimate drama,” without State aid such as it has received in Milan, Rome, Naples, Paris, Vienna, Petrograd, Copenhagen, and elsewhere on the Continent, where the physical advantages of dancing and the artistic value of Ballet are fully appreciated. The arts must flourish haphazard here! We have no national conservatoire in which this art of Ballet is taught as it is abroad. Consequently it has been less generally understood; and, being so, has had to exist in face of considerable prejudice.