Classical Mythology

CLASSICAL MYTHOLOGY IN MUSIC, DANCE, AND FILM 735

ISADORA DUNCAN: PIONEER CHAMPION

OF THE GREEK IDEAL

Isadora Duncan (1877-1927) was born in San Francisco. At a young age she be-
came interested in the dance but soon rebelled against the strictures of classical
ballet and the frivolities of the music hall to develop her own method of free-
dom and expression in dance movement, in tune with her artistic and spiritual
response to nature. Her autobiography reveals her fundamental accord with the
classical Greek spirit:

I was born by the sea, and I have noticed that all the great events of my life have taken

place by the sea. My first idea of movement, of the dance, certainly came from the rhythm

of the waves. I was born under the star of Aphrodite, Aphrodite who was also born on

the sea, and when her star is in the ascendant, events are always propitious to me.^29

In Chicago in 1895, at age eighteen, Isadora danced for Charles Fair, manager

of the Masonic Roof Garden, billed as "The California Faun." Not long afterward

in New York her appeal to the manager Augustin Daly confirms her conviction

that she was transforming Greek dance into a new American expressiveness:

J have discovered the dance. I have discovered the art which has been lost for two thou-

sand years. You are a supreme theatre artist, but there is one thing lacking in your the-

atre which made the old Greek theatre great, and this is the art of the dance—the tragic

chorus. Without this it is a head and body without legs to carry it on. I bring you the

dance. ... I am indeed the spiritual daughter of Walt Whitman. For the children of

America I will create a new dance that will express America.^30

Duncan was much attracted to the music of Ethelbert Nevin, a composer

with whom she did concerts in New York but who died young. One of her im-

portant early Greek dances (1898) was Narcissus, choreographed to his music; a

favorable review describes her performance:

Narcissus is another charming bit of pantomime. The fabled youth is depicted staring

at his own image in the water, first startled at its sudden appearance, then charmed,

fascinated at his mirrored beauty. Becoming more and more enamored, the dancer leans

forward, seemingly viewing herself from side to side, sending kisses to the liquid image,

stepping across the shallow brook and still finding the figure reflected from its surface.

The poetry of motion, the first start, the gradually growing conceit, the turning and

bending, the ecstasy of delight at finding himself so beautiful are all most convincingly

enacted by the pretty dancer.^31

Duncan gave other performances in New York, assisted by her sister and

her brother Raymond, the latter reading selections from Theocritus and Ovid as

an accompaniment to her dances, with music provided by a concealed orches-

tra. These were not so favorably received and, in 1899, the family went to Lon-

don, hoping to find understanding. Duncan tells us:

... [W]e spent most of our time in the British Museum, where Raymond made sketches
of all the Greek vases and bas-reliefs, and I tried to express them to whatever music