海角大神

Rudolf Nureyev鈥檚 life was dramatic. He was born on a train in Mongolia. (His mother and sisters were joining his father, a soldier in the Red Army.) In his 20s, on tour with the Kirov Ballet, he defected in Paris. His partnership with Margot Fonteyn of London鈥檚 Royal Ballet is legendary. Afterward, he danced all over the world as a guest star or choreographer.

His promiscuity, a penchant for dancing after his prime, and his passing in 1993 from AIDS form the dark side of the drama. In Nureyev: The Life, journalist and author Julie Kavanaugh puts us in the midst of the people who surrounded Nureyev, supporting or battling him (or both) throughout his career. Kavanaugh had access to his papers, spoke to the key players in this drama, and traveled to Ufa, the town in the western Urals where he grew up. The book is dense with detail and character but haunted by a sense of loss.

My favorite photo is one of a teenage Nureyev leaping across a ballet studio in Ufa. His arms are flung overhead, his head tipped back, and his chest puffed out. He looks like a big bird trapped in the little gray room. It鈥檚 no surprise that he would soon be dancing with the Kirov, then bolting from that company to the wider dance world in the West. For so many who speak in this book, he is the one that got away.

Nureyev鈥檚 arrival in the West was a pivotal moment in dance history. But Kavanaugh also shows us the sadness and shock among those he left behind and Nureyev鈥檚 own enduring loneliness and longing.

She brings out multiple viewpoints at every turn. Often, the comments are unattributed, except in the notes section. This streamlines the narrative, but also gives it a surreal, gossipy feeling.

Only Nureyev鈥檚 voice, speaking English with no articles, is recognizable. And it is hard to keep track of them all, like reading a long Russian novel without one of those helpful family-tree diagrams.

Having left his biological family behind when he went to Leningrad for schooling at the Kirov, Rudik, as he was called affectionately, was first 鈥渁dopted鈥� by his teacher, Alexander Pushkin, and his wife, Xenia. Kavanaugh describes the 鈥渒itchen culture鈥� in Leningrad, where artists and intellectuals gathered around a dining-room table for long meals and discussion. Nureyev couldn鈥檛 get enough of art and beauty. When he wasn鈥檛 performing he was at concerts, churches, or museums. He heard Canadian pianist Glenn Gould and saw Danish dancer Erik Bruhn on tapes smuggled into the Soviet Union.

On arriving in England, he was soon ensconced with Maude and Nigel Gosling. Maude, a former dancer, wrote dance reviews with Nigel under the pseudonym Alexander Bland. They became lifelong friends. After Nigel鈥檚 death, Rudolf looked after Maude, and she tenderly cared for him during his illness.

Nureyev was not an easy friend. He was even rude to his greatest partner, Margot Fonteyn. The older dancer gave a finish and an 鈥淓nglish鈥� elan to his still-

emerging technique and style, while Nureyev reinvigorated and extended her career. For all her sweetness and purity onstage, Fonteyn was tough. Yet he could reduce her to tears in rehearsal. Still, they were loyal to each other till the end.

Dancer Violette Verdy said of Nureyev in 1986, 鈥淚鈥檓 convinced that his greatest years as a choreographer are still ahead when he has totally removed himself as a performer.鈥� This is poignant, as he died soon after producing the only work in which he did not perform, 鈥淟a Bayadere,鈥� by Marius Petipa, for the Paris Opera Ballet.