Ballerina: Sex, Scandal, and Suffering Behind the Symbol of Perfection

Throughout her history, the ballerina has been perceived as the embodiment of beauty and perfection — she is the feminine ideal. But the reality is another story. Beginning with the earliest ballerinas, who often led double lives as concubines, Deirdre Kelly goes on to review the troubled lives of 19th-century ballerinas, who lived in poverty and worked under torturous and even life-threatening conditions. In the 20th century, George Balanchine created a contradictory ballet culture that simu…