Notes on Black Swan

What lies between the Apollonian and Dionysian? The reality of the Bunhead, captured in the modern fairytale Black Swan.

Shocking to find ballet a metaphor that men relate to.

So read! Read more. A great new book about ballet—not an oxymoron it turns out: Jennifer Homan’s astonishing, lucid Apollo’s Angels.

From Apollo’s Angels: “At the origins of ballet lay two ideas: the formal mathematical precision of the human body and the universality of human gesture.”

So? So. But, then:

“Most people’s idea of ballet is that it’s a big puffy pink glittery nightmare,” --Christopher Wheeldon, The New York Times

What I’ve learned so far:
1. Maria Taglioni, great Romantic era ballerina, was considered in her youth ill-shapen, ugly. She created new paradigm around her "defects." So there, Twiggy, Madonna!
2. Ballet steps are codified court dances: a blueprint of the "gestures" performed by the aristocratic and royal courts as far back as 1500s.

When we watch a ballet today, what do we see? Why are we interested? We are watching a moving diaorama, the archictecture of a vanish(ing?) society: aristocracy. Is our interest, our fascination, atavistic?