ESSAYS BY THE WAY
VI. — Le Pas D’Acier
By “Scrutator. ”
Some little time ago I went to see and hear (and I say “hear” advisedly) a Russian ballet with the title I have chosen for this article.
It had no proper tale around which the choregrapher built up his wonderful art — no tale, that is, which could be set out in explanatory form on the programme — but it was a tale for all that, vastly exciting, very modern and one which concerns all of us who live in ˮlands of progress.’’ It is, moreover,
a ballet of which one makes one’s own interpretation, an interpretation which is open to attack and angry refutation by all the other admirers of these inscrutable Russians, and some of them look as if they could be very angry — rather unhealthy-looking people, with white puffy faces and lank dark hair, wearing shapeless Norfolk jackets, flannel bags of incredible widths and nice long floppy ties, complete with the inevitable tortoiseshell specs., and accompanied by their female of the species.
As I saw and heard, making my own interpretation, Le Pas d’Acier was the inevitable step which has to be made when an agricultural people turn to industry.
First, the ragged and debased peasants trying to accustom themselves to the new conditions of urban
life and factory work; very convulsive dancing this, with most horrid expressive noises, and then as they became more completely industrialised their dancing became more mechanical and regular, the spontaneity of their movements had gone, some great machine now ordered their existence and the music kept up a mechanical and insistent refrain.
Only the peasant lords rebelled, pleasant-looking young hunters in forest green, the counterpart of our young squires and squirelings, for they too must fit themselves into the new conditions or else resign their leadership; so they were also fitted, with much shrill protests of music, into offices and directorships, and the great machine began to revolve harmoniously though with a mechanical harmony composed of the strange noises of our modern urban world. Does this harmony prelude man’s mastership of the machine — a time when he shall no longer be its sulky and rebellious slave, but its overlord with full powers of control?
There is a motto which states: ‘‘That the more
things change, the more they are the same. ” Now this to me is a half truth, more puzzling than any lie, for my experience is that the more things change
VI. — Le Pas D’Acier
By “Scrutator. ”
Some little time ago I went to see and hear (and I say “hear” advisedly) a Russian ballet with the title I have chosen for this article.
It had no proper tale around which the choregrapher built up his wonderful art — no tale, that is, which could be set out in explanatory form on the programme — but it was a tale for all that, vastly exciting, very modern and one which concerns all of us who live in ˮlands of progress.’’ It is, moreover,
a ballet of which one makes one’s own interpretation, an interpretation which is open to attack and angry refutation by all the other admirers of these inscrutable Russians, and some of them look as if they could be very angry — rather unhealthy-looking people, with white puffy faces and lank dark hair, wearing shapeless Norfolk jackets, flannel bags of incredible widths and nice long floppy ties, complete with the inevitable tortoiseshell specs., and accompanied by their female of the species.
As I saw and heard, making my own interpretation, Le Pas d’Acier was the inevitable step which has to be made when an agricultural people turn to industry.
First, the ragged and debased peasants trying to accustom themselves to the new conditions of urban
life and factory work; very convulsive dancing this, with most horrid expressive noises, and then as they became more completely industrialised their dancing became more mechanical and regular, the spontaneity of their movements had gone, some great machine now ordered their existence and the music kept up a mechanical and insistent refrain.
Only the peasant lords rebelled, pleasant-looking young hunters in forest green, the counterpart of our young squires and squirelings, for they too must fit themselves into the new conditions or else resign their leadership; so they were also fitted, with much shrill protests of music, into offices and directorships, and the great machine began to revolve harmoniously though with a mechanical harmony composed of the strange noises of our modern urban world. Does this harmony prelude man’s mastership of the machine — a time when he shall no longer be its sulky and rebellious slave, but its overlord with full powers of control?
There is a motto which states: ‘‘That the more
things change, the more they are the same. ” Now this to me is a half truth, more puzzling than any lie, for my experience is that the more things change