I discovered dancing. I was taken out of Brearley and sent to dancing school, and I adored it. It was the only school they could keep me in. I was with the Russians—first Michel Fokine, the only Imperial ballet master to ever leave Russia, and later with Chalif.
I did Pavlova's Gavotte at Charnegie Hall. In the Metropolitan Museum we have a delicious figurine by Malvina Hoffman showing Pavlova doing the Gavotte. I did it alone, on the great stage but it certainly wasn't any grand'chose. Don't think the house got up and stormed or anything—we were just the pupils of Chalif. But the Gavotte is so pretty. I remember coming forward in an aigre pois dress held out of here and a deep poke bonnet. I was alone doing this and I was terrified. I only wanted the joy of interpreting the dance—the Gavotte—but realizing that I was being seen, I suffered, as only the very young can suffer, the torture of being conspicuous.
I was also taught The Dying Swan, which is the most extraordinary thing because of the tremor that goes through this creature. In the most extreme positions one leg goes out, out, out, and then the head comes down, down, down, and the body is moving, quivering, in a death spasm . . . oh, it's too beautiful! It's beauty that's leaving the world.
It all came together for me when I got back to New York. I went back to dancing school and I didn't give a damn about anything else. All I've ever cared about since is movement, rhythm, being in touch—and discipline. What Fokine taught.
He was a brute. He'd put you at the barre, he'd place his cane under your leg . . . and if you couldn't raise your leg high enough, then—whack! One day he tore my leg to ribbons—all the ligaments. It just went. I was laid up with my foot up and my leg up for eight weeks. That was nothing in his life. But he taught me total discipline. And it's stood me in good stead all of my life—it's forever!
I'm talking about strict rules, bash on, up and away! . . . still, my dreams in life is to come home and think of absolutely nothing. After all, you can't think all the time. When I discovered dancing, I learned to dream.
Ur D.V., Diana Vreeland