Classical virtuosity is more than technique, line, proportion, and balance. It is as if the performer and spectator come together to hold in their hands a bird with a broken wing. The creature can be felt to stir, to struggle for freedom. Its life responds to human warmth; its wing might brush your check as it flies away.

Gelsey Kirkland

Categorized in : Hands Struggle Dance

The nature of my compulsion was such that I danced in my sleep. The entire household was sometimes awakened by loud thumping sounds coming from my room.

Gelsey Kirkland

sound sleep rooms

I embarked on a risky course of plastic surgery and silicone injections, major dental realignments and gruesome medical procedures. I pray that young dancers, those who imitate me at their peril, will avoid this blind alley. It is more than a dead end; it is a dead beginning.

Gelsey Kirkland

dancer medical praying

Fortunately for children, the uncertainties of the present always give way to the enchanted possibilities of the future.

Gelsey Kirkland

giving children way

The dance goes on forever. So shall I. So shall we.

Gelsey Kirkland

dance goes-on forever

When you are on stage you are having an affair with three thousand people.

Gelsey Kirkland

dancing dance people

Often, when you've reached a very high level of achievement, you almost become paralyzed by the idea that anything you might do might be imperfect. Perfection is just the striving, the effort, the struggle, but it's hard to remember that.

Gelsey Kirkland

perfection struggle ideas

As unnatural as dancing is, you have to find a natural way to do the unnatural.

Gelsey Kirkland

dancing dance way

... each action taken in this world has its echo in the heart.

Gelsey Kirkland

echoes taken heart

As soon as you become afraid to make a fool of yourself, you're in trouble. I decided I may as well just see if I can live with myself making millions of mistakes and learn something from it.

Gelsey Kirkland

fool mistake may

The first year with ABT I learned 13 new roles. Most were lengthy ballets, more complicated than I was used to. I have suffered from tendinitis since I was 13, and it flared up again until the pain was paralyzing. There were times I prayed I'd be sick so I wouldn't have to go on.

Gelsey Kirkland

pain sick years

I know my body. What happened is that I got so caught up in the applause I forgot how I should dance. All my life I've been what others wanted - in dancing and in life. Now I'm doing it my way.

Gelsey Kirkland

dancing body way

The voices of moral authority in the theatre demanded only punctuality and physical performance. In the light of continuing pressure and stress, the occasional lip service paid to moderation was meaningless. Starvation and poisoning were not excesses, but measures taken to stay within the norm.

Gelsey Kirkland

stress light taken

In saying my prayers, I discovered the voice of an innermost self, the raw nerve of my identity.

Gelsey Kirkland

voice self prayer

Ballet is a riddle of means and ends.

Gelsey Kirkland

ballet dance mean

At this stage of my life I would rather try and have some small impact within a company and suffer through those things than make such a big stink that nobody can trust to work with you. It's very important in an environment of a big institution that people don't feel threatened that you're going to expose them in any way.

Gelsey Kirkland

impact suffering people

You've got to break through this idea of being light as a ballerina. The heavier you'll feel, the lighter you'll look.

Gelsey Kirkland

break-through light ideas

I danced with passion to spite the music.

Gelsey Kirkland

ballet passion dance

There was a stage when Balanchine and I didn't talk. I was trying to develop my classical technique as opposed to the fast-track technique that he was pushing. We were very quiet with each other. But after two years he saw what I was doing and sent messages through other people that, yes, this is good.

Gelsey Kirkland

two people years