Dancing with Cuba: a Memoir of the Revolution.DANCING WITH CUBA: A MEMOIR OF THE REVOLUTION By Alma Guillermoprieto Alma Guillermoprieto (born May 27, 1949) is a Mexican journalist who has written extensively about Latin America for the British and American press. Her writings have also been widely disseminated within the Spanish-speaking world. . New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of : Pantheon pantheon (păn`thēŏn', –thēən), term applied originally to a temple to all the gods. The Pantheon at Rome was built by Agrippa in 27 B.C., destroyed, and rebuilt in the 2d cent. by Hadrian. Books. 2004. 304 pages. Cloth. $25. When Merce Cunningham suggests to Alma Guillermoprieto that she take a teaching job in Cuba, she knows that means she will never get into his company. Seeking a second opinion, she asks Twyla Tharp Noun 1. Twyla Tharp - innovative United States dancer and choreographer (born in 1941) Tharp for advice. Tharp looks up from tying her shoelaces and says, "If I were you, I'd take it. You're not going to get anywhere hanging around here." The year is 1969. So starts Guillermoprieto's sojourn to Fidel Castro's Cuba. What she finds in Havana is a conservatory full of avid, untrained students and a dogmatic regime distrustful dis·trust·ful adj. Feeling or showing doubt. dis·trust  ful·ly adv.dis·trust of the arts. Yes, Castro supports Alicia Alonso's Ballet Nacional de Cuba National Ballet of Cuba (Ballet Nacional de Cuba), is managed by Cuban prima ballerina assoluta Alicia Alonso and is one of the top ballet companies in the world. The artistic standards and technical severity of the dancers and the wide diversity in the aesthetic , but how committed is the Revolution to modern dance? And how committed is Guillermoprieto, who is originally from Mexico, to the Revolution? She falls in love with a guerrilla or two, but she wonders if an artist can even exist in the Revolution, which holds the labor of cutting sugar cane as the highest good. A growing sense of uselessness drives her In the edge of suicide. What brings her back is the vulnerability of her students. Toward the end of the memoir she's having trouble teaching the Graham "pleadings" (spelling it differently), which start on the floor as a contraction of despair/ecstasy. She resorts to a poem by Cesar Vallejo, and the students finally perform it beautifully, with soul. It's a transcendent moment. |
|
||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion