"Success is when you have your children's lifestyle." |
| --Ed Slott (1946- )
financial advisor, author, professional speaker |
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Born in St. Petersburg, Russia. Pavlova's parents were poor, and she was a frail and sickly child. From an early age she was determined to become a ballerina and entered the Imperial Ballet School of St Petersburg in 1892. By the time of her graduation in 1899 she was recognised by teachers and critics as a phenomenally gifted dancer and was accepted immediately by the Imperial Ballet. She received soloist status in 1906.
She danced no fewer then 18 leading parts on the Maryinsky stage and was Michael Fokine's first Armida in Pavilion d'Armide. Pavlova was equally brilliant in character parts and in the parts of nymphs and spirits. She first performed The Dying Swan, a solo choreographed for her by Fokine in 1905, and it became her signature piece. The role depended on extraordinary fluidity of movement and the expression of poetic feeling for its effects.
She began her tours abroad in 1907, visiting Stockholm, Copenhagen, and Berlin. She made her debut in both New York and London in 1920. Pavlova toured Europe in 1907, appeared briefly with the Ballets Russes of the Russian impresario Serge Diaghilev, and, in 1910 made her American debut with the Russian dancer Mikhail Mordkin at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. After 1910 she preferred to star in her own company and toured world wide. As a result of these extensive tours, managed by her husband, Victor Dandre, she became the most famous and the wealthiest dancer of her time.
She founded her own company in 1911, and until 1925, when she retired, she danced extensively in Europe, the Americas, Africa, Austalia and Asia, often bringing ballet for the first time to remote areas. In 1912 she bought Ivy House, Golders Green in London which was her home for the rest of her life.
Conservative in her aesthetics, Pavlova was an outstanding representative of classical Russian ballet, admired for the poetic quality of her movement. She kept in her repertoire the classical ballets as well as new choreographic miniatures such as Night, Waltz-Caprice (music by A. Rubinshtein), Dragonfly (music by Chreisler), Californian Poppy (music by A. Tchaikovsky). She was also interested in ethnic dances and in the dance techniques of India and Japan. Her most famous classical roles were in Giselle, Swan Lake, Les Sylphides, Don Quixote, Coppélia, and in Fokine's Dying Swan .
In 1929, Herbert Sachse, the chef of the Hotel Esplanade in Perth, Western Australia, created the dessert Pavlova to celebrate the visit of Anna Pavlova to Australia. This dessert later became Australia's national dessert.
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"God gives talent. Work transforms talent into genius." |
| --Anna Pavlova (1881-1931)
Russian ballerina, the most famous classical ballerina of her era |
"Master technique and then forget about it and be natural." |
| --Anna Pavlova (1881-1931)
Russian ballerina, the most famous classical ballerina of her era |
"What exactly is success? For me it is to be found not in applause, but in the satisfaction of feeling that one is realizing one's ideal." |
| --Anna Pavlova (1881-1931)
Russian ballerina, the most famous classical ballerina of her era |
"The right to happiness is fundamental." |
| --Anna Pavlova (1881-1931)
Russian ballerina, the most famous classical ballerina of her era |
"When a small child, I thought that success spelled happiness. I was wrong, happiness is like a butterfly which appears and delights us for one brief moment, but soon flits away." |
| --Anna Pavlova (1881-1931)
Russian ballerina, the most famous classical ballerina of her era |
"No one can arrive from being talented alone, work transforms talent into genius." |
| --Anna Pavlova (1881-1931)
Russian ballerina, the most famous classical ballerina of her era |
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