Dancers, like all artists, inhabit their own world of beauty, idealism, and extremely hard work. Their priorities revolve around the eternal quest for artistic truth and expressive excellence.
Along with all of us, however, they also inhabit another world, sometimes less wonderful. I’m writing as extremism, racism and violence erupt in many places. There are wars in Africa, Asia, South America and the Middle East, natural disaster and widespread crime in North America and Australia, and all around the world, millions of refugees are fleeing persecution and struggling to find a life.
In Britain and Europe, quarrelling over political relationships, theatre people are terrified for their careers, their futures and themselves. Quite suddenly, thousands of “foreigners” may not be allowed to continue with their lives and work. People may be sacked or deported with no warning. Governments and parliaments are in turmoil. In many places food and medicine may run out, as the old certainties dissolve like smoke. There may be riots, possibly troops on the streets. The situation is potentially dangerous.
Dancers are vulnerable. They’re chronically underpaid, conspicuous, and often foreign, which makes them natural scapegoats. In times of crisis, authority regards dance companies as superfluous luxury. Budgets are frozen or blocked, companies close abruptly. If trouble starts where you are, what can you do about it? What if you lose your job? Without a work/residence permit, could you be thrown out of the country? How can you safeguard yourself? At what price?
If you’re worried about this, here are a couple of tips. First, register with your consulate, if you haven’t already done so. They need to know where you are – if they can’t find you, they can’t help. There may be some assistance (legal or otherwise) through the performers’ unions. Try to have enough money to hand and an up-to-date travel plan, so you can leave at short notice. Have a Plan “B” as well, in case something goes wrong — how many alternative routes are there to the airport, railway station, motorway, harbour? Check the news, in your own language and on local programmes. Use social media, stay up to date. Alert your family at home — you might need funds, consular help, and somewhere to go. Communicate, always.
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the things you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream.”
–H. Jackson Brown
You might be eligible for dual nationality. It’s expensive and time-consuming, but if it works, you’ll be allowed to stay put — if that’s what you want, get on it today. You’ll need to apply through local government; find them on the internet. They’ll want passports, birth and marriage certificates, tax returns, immigration documents, bank stuff, educational and professional qualifications, payslips and possibly medical information – all of these in the original and in duplicate, translated (at your expense) into the language of the country to which you’re applying. It takes time, and you may not have much, so don’t waste it.
“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”
— Paulo Coelho
If you’re trying to get home, check whether this is safe or even possible. Find out what jobs or assistance are available once you’re there. Most dancers have little or nothing saved, and you’ll need to live somehow, so don’t be too choosy.
“The only thing I fear more than change is no change. ” —Twyla Tharp
Throughout history, dancers have found themselves in situations like this. Being imaginative and quick-witted, they often emerge unscathed, but don’t take this outcome for granted.
“Opportunity dances with those already on the dance floor.”
— H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
In the summer of 1870, with Paris under siege during the Franco-Prussian war, dancers arrived at the Opéra to find it closed without warning – from one day to the next they were out of a job, in a city that was at war and running out of food. Some survived, others did not.
In 1918, Karsavina, her husband and her baby son fled all across Russia and the Arctic Circle between warring White and Red armies, narrowly escaping arrest and death several times, travelling over two thousand miles by train, steamship, farm cart, coal freighter, rowing boat and on foot, enduring hunger, thirst, extremes of heat and cold, exhaustion and perpetual danger, month after month, before finally arriving safely in England.
Endurance is patience concentrated.
— Thomas Carlyle
Nureyev, touring Paris with the Kirov (later Maryinsky) ballet, was told at the airport in Paris that he was being sent back to a Russia from which he knew there was no escape. He made a split-second decision, evaded his KGB minders and gained asylum with French border police. Many great dancers, including Baryshnikov, Makarova, Valery Panov, Li Cunxing and others have found themselves in the same position, having to make sudden, decisive choices which would change their lives forever.
“Living fearlessly is not the same thing as never being afraid. It’s good to be afraid occasionally. Fear is a great teacher.”
— Michael Ignatieff
The German dancer/choreographer Kurt Jooss, ordered by the Nazis to sack all Jewish members of his company, refused and fled with all his dancers across the border into Holland and then on to England. In Syria in the middle of armed conflict, the Dare dance group have kept their courage and their art alive for years, dancing in the streets of Latakia.
“The journey between who you once were, and who you are now becoming, is where the dance of life really takes place.”
— Barbara De Angelis
I toured the Soviet Union, with several dancers and crew from former Soviet countries. After the last performance we learned our flight had been cancelled — the next flight would be in one week. Our visas had expired. We had no money, no right to stay, no way to leave. For hours we waited, expecting to be arrested any minute. Everyone was worried, and the Eastern Europeans understandably terrified. At last another airline with an empty plane returning to Switzerland, invited us to go with them. The relief was indescribable.
Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why they call it “the present.” — Eleanor Roosevelt
Teheran once had a flourishing ballet company with classical and contemporary repertoire and distinguished foreign artists. In Autumn 1978 they were still performing “The Sleeping Beauty”, but the political situation deteriorated rapidly, and in early 1979 everybody who could get a flight left as soon as possible – soon afterwards the regime collapsed, and the company was dissolved.
Please don’t be alarmed by all this. I’m not trying to frighten you, but I do think it’s wise to pay careful attention to what’s happening. Almost certainly everything will be fine, and life will go on as usual, but the best thing is to stay alert, keep informed and be prepared to react quickly — this is pretty much a dancer’s natural state anyway. Have an exit strategy in place and know where to find help and support if you need them. That way, you and the people you love will be safe, and you can continue to make the most of your extraordinary dancing life.
©Jeremy Leslie-Spinks
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Thank you for writing these wise words.