The Ballet
Dancers Under My Lens. By Cyril.W. Beaumont. (C. \V. Beaumont. 18s.)
THE world-wide reputation enjoyed by the Sadlcr's Wells ballet is as remarkable a phenomenon as the historian of the theatre has ever had to chronicle, for in less than a decade it has grown from unfashionable obscurity to a position in which it has no rival in Europe. The credit for that must be variously attributed, but there are two names before all others that are inseparable from the achievement, namely • those of Lilian Baylis and Miss Ninette de Valois. 'Books about the ballet have come tumbling from the presses in great abundance, but when it is charged against the Press by Miss Manchester that editors underrate the importance of the ballet it should be pointed.out that for all its reclame the vogue of the ballet is still a minority movement in the English theatre with none ' of the strong roots in national dance such as nourish .it in other lands.'
It, can,, however, be said with truth that ballet-goers seek to be intelligent and well-informed. about the subtleties of their pleasure. For that reason such a book as Misses Manchester and Morley have written is likely to be:much discussed, and though its quarto formst suggests a picture-book rather than a lively conversational Com- parison of ballet in Russia and England, its merits will be rapidly bruited among the Covent Garden queuers. Miss Morley was for several years during and after the war a newspaper correspondent ill Russia. She studied the ballet assiduously, and was permitted tti take photographs, of it in action. She is emphatic that authentic Russian ballet has never been seen outside the borders of the Soviet Union, for eitn Diaghilev when he first brought his company rn Paris was infected with unorthodox and schismatic elements. Mss; Manchester is extremely well-informed about the English ballet, that is, Sadkr's Wells, and the two ladies, in dialogue form, exchanv their views on all the topics of the ballet from lofty aesthetic con- sideration to the smallest details of dress materials. Miss Morley"; photographs are a shade disappointing and convey a much less vivii impression of Soviet ballet than her lively descriptions of works unknown in this country.
Mr. Beaumont has done well to make a selection from his ballet' criticisms published between 5922 and 5948, for here is matter for the historian. From his pages one gets not only opinions, impression; and sometimes predictions, but precise descriptions of the appearance, physique, capabilities and manncrsisms of the dancers who have com_ under his observation. 'Mr. Beaumont brings to bear a calm an-' analytical mind in an atmosphere not generally conducive to strict
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