book review 'de bovenbenen van Olga de Haas'

[mekyria]

My library books were overdue at the start of januari and I decided that I should work my way throgh the unread books in my bookcases before borrowing from the public library again. I wanted to read ‘De bovenbenen van Olga de Haas’ for over a year now, and found it for a discount price at the Slechte. This book is written by a academic writer who did indepth research between 1993-2000 in ballet, the Dutch development of danceschools in the Netherlands and the views on a dancers life. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in dance: it’s well-written, well documented and entertaining. More then that, it adds information from dancers on dancers. Something that is lacking in a lot of other dance research publication, that focus on the repression of females, the unhealthy body image that ballet promotes and everything that dancers have to give up to follow their dream.

 In her book she strongly argues that dancers don’t give up living to be a dancer. With many examples from interviews, articles this book made me feel like I had an inside peek in the life of dancers. I really like how she explained the professional dance world in the Netherlands, the difference between modern and classic ballet, the opportunities for dancing in a company and the attitudes of dancers towards secondary education, injuries and pain.

Weak points:

-the book is in Dutch, which makes it hard to recommend to international readers. However, I encourage you to check out the English articles of the same writer.

-At times I found the reference to the dancer as a mythical creature on the weak side. She uses several articles and two movies about ballet dancers to make the point that the life of a dancer is often idealised. However, some of the articles speak of the image of the dancer on stage, as opposed to the dancer as a whole.

-the main theme throughout the book is the life and death of Dutch dancer Olga de Haas. The anecdote about her is repeated over and over again in every chapter, which annoyed me because it didn’t add new information to what was already written.

 Interesting articles:

The message of pain. Listening to your body can help to prevent injuries. Rotterdam: Codarts University for the arts

 

‘knowledge makes you better- online publication:

http://users.fmg.uva.nl/aaalten/Lectorale%20rede%20boekje.pdf

 website van Anna Aalten:

http://users.fmg.uva.nl/aaalten/