A GLITTERING STAR OF THE IMPERIAL BALLET

Press, Volume C, Issue 29536, 10 June 1961, Page 3

A GLITTERING STAR OF THE IMPERIAL BALLET

Dancing in Petersburg. By Princess RomanovskvKrassinsky. Gollancz. 272 PPThe author of this biography is one of the most famous of the Russian ballerinas. AU the books on ballet dwell fondly upon her career: they speak of her capriciousness, her connexion with the Imperial family, and of her technical and artistic triumphs. Her great career is now a matter of theatrical history. She graduated at the Imperial Ballet School in 1890, and her last appearance on stage was in London in July, 1936. She was then 64 years old. Hers was a family abounding in sp.rit and vitality; a portrait reproduced in this volume shows her dancing the mazurka with her father when he was 83 years old. Even before she graduated from the Imperial Ballet School (with the first prize, the Complete Works of Lermontov), she had fallen in love with the heir to the throne, the Tsarevitch Nicholas. The feeling was mutual, for when the diaries of the Emperor Nicholas II were published after the Revolution. various entries for the summer of 1890 record his interest. “July 17th. Tuesday: I like Kschessinska very much. July 30th, Monday: Gossiped at her window with little Kachessinska. The young ballerina herself took the next step. In the face of parental opposition, she set up housekeeping on her own. ‘There was a housewarming to celebrate my move and the beginning of independence. The guests showered me with presents, and the Tsarevitch gave me a vodka service, eight little gold glasses studded with precious stones, and his photograph inscribed 'To my dear Pannj.' as he called me.” The idyll, however, was brief. As the author says. “The Tsarevitch and I had often spoken of his imminent marriage leading to our inevitable separation. He had not concealed from me that, aware of his duty, he con-

sidered Princess Alice of | Hesse the most likely of all [the fiancees proposed to him, and that he felt a growing attraction to her.” The break was a painful one. “For the moment there was boundless terrible suffering, the wrench of losing my Nikki.’” More fortunate than many, however, she had her career to think of. In the years that followed success followed success. Her greatest early triumph was during the autumn of 1899, when “The Daughter of Pharaoh.” a four-act ballet by SaintGeorges and Petipa, was specially revived for her. During this period the Italian Pierina Legnani turned 32 fouettes in a performance of Ivanov’s “Tulip of Harlem" in St. Petersburg, the first time such a feat had been done, at least in Russia. Kschessinska soon was able to equal Legnani and became the first Russian to master the famous 32. Incidentally she and Legnani were the only two dancers connected with the Maryinsky Theatre to be given the

title of prima ballerina assoluta. After 1900 Kschessinska’s name was coupled with that of the Grand Duke Andre Wladimirovitch. a nephew of the Tsar. This was a romance that endured. A son was born; but it was not until after the revolution that they were able to marry. Kschessinska then took the name of Romanovsky-Krassinsky. But all that was far in the future. Up till 1914 the dancer was enjoying not only Russian, but also European triumphs on a scale that will probably never be repeated. She was particularly admired in Vienna and Paris. In 1911 she was persuaded to go to London where she danced in "Swan Lake" with Nijinsky They "were years of gaiety. Everyone admired her. “Small, slight and dark, with sparkling black eyes, she combined Russian expressiveness with Italian technical virtuosity." Her volatile nature is shown by anecdotes like this one. Speaking of a young soldier, Mitoussov, whom she liked, she writes.

“One day, knowing that he was at manoeuvres, I entered his quarters and placed my framed photogtiaph on a table together with ‘ a bunch of violets, asking his orderly to say nothing when he came back. And the charming Mitoussov really fell in love with me after that!” At the beginning of the Revolution she went to France. She was fortunate in many ways. Both the Grand Duke Andre . and her son were with her. and later she was able to begin a new career as a teacher of ballet id Paris'. The studio at No. 6 Avenue Viori-Whitcomb became world-famous. Among her pupils were Pearl Argyle. Pamela May. Lipkovska, and Tatiana Riabouchinska Kschessinska has had her share of adulation, although the fame of artists whose sphere is the theatre is transitory. Nevertheless she will be remembered as one “who for a quarter. of a century was the image, the vfry type of the great star, of the prima ballerina assoluta of the Imperial ballet.”