A good article by Martha Graham
I am a Dancer
By Martha Graham
I am a dancer. I believe that we learn by practice. Whether it
means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live
by practicing living, the principles are the same. In each it is
the performance of a dedicated precise set of acts, physical or
intellectual, from which comes shape of achievement, a sense of
one's being, a satisfaction of spirit. One becomes in some area an
athlete of God.
To practice means to perform, in the face of all obstacles, some
act of vision, of faith, of desire. Practice is a means of inviting
the perfection desired.
I think the reason dance has held such an ageless magic for the
world is that it has been the symbol of the performance of living.
Even as I write, time has begun to make today yesterday-the past.
The most brilliant scientific discoveries will in time change and
perhaps grow obsolete, as new scientific manifestations emerge. But
art is eternal, for it reveals the inner landscape, which is the
soul of man.
Many times I hear the phrase "the dance of life." It is an
expression that touches me deeply, for the instrument through which
the dance speaks is also the instrument through which life is
lived-the human body. It is the instrument by which all the
primaries of life are made manifest. It holds in its memory all
matters of life and death and love. Dancing appears glamorous,
easy, delightful. But the path to the paradise of the achievement
is not easier than any other. There is fatigue so great that the
body cries, even in its sleep. There are times of complete
frustration, there are daily small deaths. Then I need all the
comfort that practice has stored in my memory, a tenacity of
faith.
It takes about ten years to make a mature dancer. The training is
twofold. First comes the study and practice of the craft which is
the school where you are working in order to strengthen the
muscular structure of the body. The body is shaped, disciplined,
honored, and in time, trusted. The movement becomes clean, precise,
eloquent, truthful. Movement never lies. It is a barometer telling
the state of the soul's weather to all who can read it. This might
be called the law of the dancer's life-the law which governs its
outer aspects.
Then comes the cultivation of the being from which whatever you
have to say comes. It doesn't just come out of nowhere, it comes
out of a great curiosity. The main thing, of course, always is the
fact that there is only one of you in the world, just one, and if
that is not fulfilled then something has been lost. Ambition is not
enough; necessity is everything. It is through this that the
legends of the soul's journey are retold with all their tragedy and
their bitterness and sweetness of living. It is at this point that
he weep of life catches up with the mere personality of the
performer, and while the individual becomes greater, the personal
becomes less personal. And there is grace. I mean the grace
resulting from faith faith in life, in love, in people, in the
act of dancing. All this is necessary to any performance in life
which is magnetic, powerful, rich in meaning.
In a dancer, there is a reverence for such forgotten things as the
miracle of the small beautiful bones and their delicate strength.
In a thinker, there is a reverence for the beauty of the alert and
directed and lucid mind. In all of us who perform there is an
awareness of the smile which is part of the equipment, or gift, of
the acrobat. We have all walked the high wire of circumstance at
times. We recognize the gravity pull of the earth as he does. The
smile is there because he is practicing living at that instant of
danger. He does not choose to fall.
At times I fear walking that tightrope. I fear the venture into the
unknown. But that is part of the act of creating and the act of
performing. That is what a dancer does.