Ninette de Valois - Adventurous Traditionalist

[alison]

This landed in my inbox the other day, but I've only just spotted it:

 

Dance Books is delighted to announce publication of the book 'Ninette de Valois: Adventurous Traditionalist' an expanded record of the Conference held at the Royal Ballet School in 2011.

 

Ninette de Valois was gifted with myriad talents. To summarise these as dancer, choreographer, artistic director and theatre administrator tells only a fraction of her story. What is lacking in such a summary are the nuances, the varying facets within each of those categories. It has required a wealth of writers, teachers, performers, colleagues, one-time students and collaborators to come together to engage with and celebrate the complexity of this remarkable woman. More details in her portrait may be gleaned from the titles of the sections into which the volume has been divided: Biography; Teaching; Wordsmith; Company; Turkey; Choreography; Collaborations; Herself. Yet these headings merely intimate the strengths of her private inner resources (her acumen, astounding foresight, dedication, daring) and the diversity of her public achievements, the realising and the steady but relentless expanding of her vision both for a company and of the potentials of dance as an art-form. Determining those strengths and that diversity is the objective of Ninette de Valois: Adventurous Traditionalist.

 

As well as more than 300 pages of text and photographs the book includes a free DVD, playing for more than four hours, of material recorded at the Conference (including a complete performance of Yeats' 'The King of the Great Clock Tower' choreographed by de Valois) and rare archive recordings.

 

Full details and ordering facilities may be found at:

 

http://www.dancebooks.co.uk/