LILI at Ballet - Hardcover

Rachel Isadora (rachelisadora.com) began dancing at the age of eight. She trained at George Balanchine's School of American Ballet and has danced professionally. She has illustrated many books set in the world of dance and theater, including Opening Night, My Ballet Class, Swan Lake, The Little Match Girl, and Ben's Trumpet, which received the Caldecott Honor Award and the Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Award. Rachel lives in New York City with her family.

Who can resist a peek at young artists in training? Isadora gifts her heroine, Lily, with a quintessential combination of dreams and determination, then allows us to sit in on the ballet class that Lili attends four times a week. Lili and fellow students model their dance wardrobes, demonstrate their exercises and steps, and imagine themselves dancing celebrated roles in a number of ballets. Each new element, be it a practice tutu, one of the five basic positions or a movement like a passe en pointe, receives its own illustration and is captioned in unornamented cursive script. Budding balletomanes will especially enjoy the detailed discussion of the ever-wondrous pointe shoe; another welcome section focuses on a class just for boys. Two depictions of full-scale ballet productions expand to fill entire spreads with dramatic color; as if to distinguish theatrical illusion from the arduous work behind the scenes, the rest of the book is rendered in pale washes. A former dancer whose daughter is enrolled at New York City's prestigious School of the American Ballet, Isadora presents ballet with familiarity and respect--she romanticizes neither the suffering nor the glory, and emphasizes only Lily's dedication. Brava! Ages 4-8.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.