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Bad Language: Transpositions in Mark Morris's Dido and Aeneas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 August 2012

Selby Wynn Schwartz
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Extract

In the middle of Mark Morris's ballet Dido and Aeneas, set to the Henry Purcell opera of the same title, a female dancer mimes the story of the Greek goddess Diana and her unfortunate suitor, Actaeon. While hunting in the mountains, Actaeon catches sight of Diana bathing nude, and the fiercely chaste goddess transforms him into a stag; his own well-trained hounds, baying triumphantly, turn on their master. When the word “mountain” is sung, the dancer marks out two jagged peaks over her head with one hand. When the hunter Actaeon is mentioned by name, the dancer mimes a bow being arched and an arrow shot from it. Then, as the line “here, here, Actaeon met his fate,” is being sung, the dancer points one finger down at a spot on the ground, nodding emphatically. It was here, she is saying—right here, where I am pointing, see?

Type
Articles
Information
Dance Research Journal , Volume 44 , Issue 2 , Winter 2012 , pp. 71 - 94
Copyright
Copyright © Congress on Research in Dance 2012

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