Evelyn Juers
Auteur van House of Exile: War, Love and Literature, from Berlin to Los Angeles
Werken van Evelyn Juers
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- female
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- Australia
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literary critic
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Statistieken
- Werken
- 4
- Leden
- 74
- Populariteit
- #238,154
- Waardering
- 3.5
- Besprekingen
- 3
- ISBNs
- 15
- Talen
- 1
For me, the middle section of this biography is the most intriguing. The book begins with an explanation of Juers' personal relationship with Philippa Cullen, relevant partly because she died so tragically young at 25, and partly because it explains the biographer's approach to the task. Part One is about Cullen's family history, on both her mother's and father's side. Part Two is about her childhood in Beaumaris and Sydney and her coming of age, and I posted a Sensational Snippet from this part about Juer's inclusion of the history of the Cullen house in the bio. But it's Part Three that transfixed me...
At the risk of provoking howls of dismay, I should preface my thoughts with the truth about my lack of experience with dance as an art form. As a child I was taken to the ballet where I hated the way the beautiful music was drowned out by the thumping of the ballet-shoe blocks on the floor. (We had seats near the front.) Much later, I saw a doco about the damage done to the feet of ballerinas from dancing en pointe, and decided then and there that I would never pay to watch women ruin their feet like that. We wouldn't do it to animals, but it is done to women (but not men, of course) in the name of art. So much for ballet...
I do like the kind of dancing that Hollywood made famous in toe-tapping musicals. I could watch Fred and Ginger all day, but that kind of dancing is not popular any more. Those magnificent dancing troupes depended on dozens of underpaid young women putting in hours of practice to get the choreography perfect, and nobody is willing to pay the real cost of that kind of perfection these days. I also occasionally like watching competitive ballroom dancing with the jazzy costumes on TV, but I've never seen it live.
But modern dance — reeling and writhing or physical jerks? Call me a philistine if you like, but it doesn't interest me at all. Juers' achievement with this book is to make a bio of a dancer who I've never heard of, compulsively readable to someone like me. For anyone interested in dance, it will be unputdownable.
I was fascinated by Philippa Cullen's conception of dance... what she wanted to do was to integrate the movement of the body with the music of the theremin. Her aim is for the dancer to have precise control of volume, duration, pitch, timbre and location, and for dancers to be able to control each other's sound.
Now, if you're not familiar with the theramin, watch this video of Celia Sheen's rendition of that eerie theme for Midsomer Murders, and pay particular attention to the tiny movements of her fingers which produce variations in tone, pitch, duration and volume. What Philippa Cullen wanted to do was to achieve similar effects using the whole body. If only there were a video of one of her performances!
Notice at the end of the video too, the credit for the designer of the theremin, Tony Henk. You can't just buy a theremin and take lessons like you can with a guitar or a clarinet. It has to be built, by someone who knows what they're doing.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTZK9FNgK74]
But, barely out of her teens, Philippa applies for a travel grant from the Australia Council and sets off alone for Europe where (despite not speaking German and having awkward, demoralising and sometimes disturbing relationships with some horrible men as well) she undertakes incredibly theoretical studies to achieve her ambitions.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2021/11/30/the-dancer-a-biography-for-philippa-cullen-b...… (meer)