Review: Greek Dance Author(s): Franoise Carter Source: The Classical Review, New Series, Vol. 49, No.

1 (1999), pp. 189-190 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/713951 . Accessed: 13/07/2011 16:34
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THE CLASSICAL REVIEW

189

GREEK

DANCE

F. G. NAEREBOUT: Attractive Performances. Ancient Greek Dance: Three Preliminary Studies. Pp. xix + 451. Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1997. Cased, Hrl. 160. ISBN: 90-5063-307-2. of most studiesof Despitethe well-documented importance dancein ancientGreece, ancientGreekculturehardlymentiondanceat all. Furthermore, claimsNaerebout, the specialiststudyof ancientGreekdanceis at a deadend. Thiswide-ranging study seeks to redressthe balanceby proposinga research modelto set scholarson a new course.The workis dividedinto threepreliminary interrelated and studies. The firstpartis a historiography the workalready of done sinceA.D.600 up to the present. This includes not only historieswrittenabout ancient Greek dance, but examplesof how attemptsto reconstructor capturethe spirit of the dance have influencedthe developmentof Westerntheatricaldance. Landmarksinclude the Greekchoraldancewhichled to the developsixteenth-century attemptto recreate ment of ballet, opera, and, N. should add, the English court masque.Interestin Graeco-Roman balletd'action,ballet that pantomimeled to the eighteenth-century incorporatesmime gesturesto tell a story; Isadora Duncan'sattemptto recreate ancient Greek dance in reaction to classical ballet techniquewas an important contributionto the emergenceof modern dance. However,since the 1930s a gap has opened up betweenscholarsand the theatre.Lillian Lawler's invaluable work of (1939-64)broughtthe studyof ancientGreekdanceinto the mainstream classical scholarship, but since the 1940s there has been increasing specializationand fragmentation. The secondpartis a criticaloverview textsandimagesas sources the studyof of for ancientGreekdance.Thereis a hugeproblem movingfromstatictext or imageto in movement;a pictureonly has worth as a historicaldocumentif accompaniedby wordsof interpretation. Froma formalpointof viewGreekdanceis a lost artandwill remainso as long as thereis no new and radically different evidence. Apartfromthe treatisePeri Orcheseos attributed Lucian,thereis no other work to second-century extantdealingexclusively with ancientGreekdancing.No technicaltreatisedealing withdanceis at present knownto havesurvived. Nor,it seems,do anysourcesreferto a notation system or to any work providinga technical descriptionof dance movements choreographies. or Dancewas handeddownexclusively oraltradition; by it is thus highly unlikelythat actual dancescould havebeen preserved unchanged downthe centuries. Greekpaintedpotteryis the most important sourceof danceimagery, we need but to be surethatthe artisanintended portray to dance.N. proposes working a definition of danceto decidewhetheran imagedepictsdanceor not, and we need to takeinto accountdistortions restrictions and Textsandimagesshould imposedby the medium. be collectedsystematically category, in by bearing mindthatno staticimagecan assist in recreating singlemovement thatmovement not knownbeforehand. a if is Scholars need to focus not on howthe ancientGreeksdancedbut on the questionof 'what dancewas all about'(p. 273). For this, freshsourcecriticism and a model for future research required. is Part three providesa theoreticalframework the study of dancingat public for events in ancient Greece.The model is made up of four building blocks: dance (followingN.'s definitionof whatconstitutesdance);dance as a constituentpart of the of have publicperformances; mobilization the audience(performances to attract
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Publicevents contain multimedial the public);and communication. performances meansof communicating. an whichprovide effective Dancingplaysan important part in these performances becauseof its non-verbal nature,but dancehas meaningonly within a specific cultural context, as part of an event. Because almost every thereis usuallya verbaltext, and sincethe actualdance is performance multimedial movements ancientGreecearehardlyknownat all, we shouldfocuson the verbal of in the were sourcesof information orderto investigate specific waysin whichmessages As therearemanywho considerdanceto be a medium communicated. N. recognizes, in of communication its own right, whetherby means of structuralor expressive of the vitality,and so on. Nevertheless, way that qualities,as a celebration enhanced and contextual,so that a rigorousanalysis, signs are decoded is culture-specific and lighton whatdanceactually categorization, typologyof sourcescan shedfurther meantfor the ancientGreeks. with a Greekvocabulary the dance,although of This book is well documented thereare a numberof typos (including 86, 206, 212 n. 478, 227 n. 521, 249, 267, pp. marksthat detracts 321, 350, 352, 347). Thereis also a frequentuse of exclamation In discourse. the sectionon iconography, readers would fromscholarly non-specialist appreciateillustrationsshowing, for example,the artisticconventionsthat differentiated athletic from dance movement. A specific example demonstratingthe of application the modelwouldhavebeen welcomebut, N. tells us, this will haveto N. wait for futurepublications. regretsthat specialiststudieson danceproducedby Thatis disputable, since scholars. but classicalscholarsarereadonlyby otherclassical of his own workis of interestto a wide readership, Englishtranslations quotations shouldbe given. of workdone Thisbook provides usefuloverview a vastsubject, a bringing together by dancers, dance historians,and classicalspecialists.It highlightsthe pervasive of theatrical influenceof ancientGreekdanceon the development Western dance,as wellas the problems to actualGreekdances.It is to be besettingattempts reconstruct for framework futureresearch shedmorelight on the will hoped that N.'stheoretical agent in ancient Greek importanceof dance as a mobilizingand communicating society. Ehime FRAN7OISE CARTER University, Japan

NON-ELITE

GREEKS

A. POWELL (ed.): The Greek World. Pp. xiv + 622, ills. London and New York: Routledge, 1997. Paper, ?30. ISBN: 0-415-17042-7. Despite its succinct title, this book is not just a voluminous and conventional introduction to the subject, but rather an experiment:in twenty-sevenpapers, of subdividedinto four sections,the editor provides'a demonstration some of the used by analystsof Greekhistory'.The focus is most influentialnew approaches Of decidedlynot on history from an upper-class perspective. course,the choice of it contributors and impliesa certainpre-selection, consequently is hardlysurprising that some approaches, scholarlyworld, are especiallyoutside the Anglo-American eventhough one witha stimulating not found.Nonetheless, is confronted panorama, one might at times wonder what exactly is supposed to be new about certain The approaches. volumehas a good indexand eachessayhas its own bibliography. The firstsection,'TheGreekMajority', refersto non-aristocrats so to speak, and,
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