Kirjahaku

From 'The Story of O' to 'The Sexual Life of Catherine M.', readers have been enthralled with sexually subversive memoirs by women. But even those erotic classics don't navigate the psychosexual terrain that Toni Bentley covers when she meets a lover who introduces her to a radical and unexpected pleasure.

The author of Winter Season and Sisters of Salome recounts her experiences with a lover who taught her the art of sexual dominance and submission, encounters that awakened her erotic nature, furthered her understanding of a woman's sexual power, and introduced her to the spiritual and psychological elements of sexuality. Reprint. 40,000 first printing.

Toni Bentley, a dancer for George Balanchine, the greatest ballet maker of the 20th century, tells the story of Serenade, his iconic masterpiece, and what it was like to dance--and live--in his world at New York City Ballet during its legendary era. At age seventeen, Toni Bentley was chosen by Balanchine, then in his final years, to join the New York City Ballet. From both backstage and onstage, she carries us through the serendipitous history and physical intricacies and demands of Serenade its dazzling opening, with seventeen women in a double-diamond pattern; its radical, even jazzy, use of the highly refined language that is ballet; its place in the choreographer's own dramatic story of his immigration to the United States from Soviet Russia; its mystical--and literal--embodiment of the tradition of classical ballet in just thirty-three minutes. Bentley takes us inside the rarefied, intense, and thrilling world Balanchine created through his lifelong devotion to celebrating and expanding female beauty and strength--a world that, inevitably, passed upon his death. An intimate elegy to grace and loss and to the imprint of a towering artist and his transcendent creation on Bentley's own life, Serenade A Balanchine Story is a rich narrative by a dynamic artist about the nature of art itself at its most ephemeral and glorious.

A ballerina tells the story of George Balanchine's iconic masterpiece, Serenade, and what it is like to be one the young women who danced it, lived it, during his lifetime. At age seventeen, Toni Bentley was chosen by Balanchine, then in his final years, to join the New York City Ballet. From backstage and onstage, she carries us through both the serendipitous history and physical intricacies and demands of Serenade--its dazzling opening, with seventeen women in a double-diamond pattern; its radical, even jazzy, use of the highly refined language that is ballet; its place in the choreographer's own dramatic story of emigration to the U.S. from Bolshevik Russia; its profound influence on the art form internationally. Bentley takes us inside the rarefied, intense and thrilling world Balanchine created through his lifelong devotion to celebrating and expanding female beauty and strength--a world that, inevitably, passed upon his death. An intimate elegy to grace and loss and the imprint of a towering artist and his transcendent creation on her life, Serenade: A Balanchine Story is a rich narrative by a woman artist about the nature of art itself at its most fleeting, dynamic, and glorious.

The origins of the art of exotic dancing lie in English drama and Viennese opera: Oscar Wilde's 1893 play Salome, and Richard Strauss's 1905 opera based on it, brought onto the stage a female character who captured and dominated the audience with the raw power of her naked body. Her Dance of the Seven Veils shocked and fascinated, and Salome became a pop icon on both sides of the Atlantic. Toni Bentley explores how four influential women embraced the persona of the femme fatale and transformed the misogynist image of a dangerously sexual woman into a form of personal liberation.

An inside look at one of the world's great dance companies, and an intimate account of the emotional and intellectual development of a young woman dedicated to one of the most demanding of all the arts. Toni Bentley's association with the New York City Ballet began when she was accepted by the affiliated School of American Ballet at the age of 11. Seven years later, she became a member of the company. In the fall of 1980, as the winter season opened, she found herself facing an emotional crisis: her dancing was not going well. At 22 she felt that her life had lost direction. To try to make something of her experience, on paper if not on stage, she began to keep a journal, describing her day-to-day activities and looking back on her past. This volume is the result, offering glimpses of some notable members of the City ballet, with, at the centre, the man whose vision they all served - George Balanchine.