Volume 24, Number 19 · November 24, 1977
Mind and Body
By Lincoln Kirstein
Afterimages
by Arlene Croce
Knopf, 466 pp., $12.95
Theatrical criticism is surely one of the most awkward, slippery, and transient of all observant crafts. Its ephemeral reference corresponds to the fragility of the performances it recalls. The artifact, the printed word, persists for judgment; staged action instantaneously becomes matter for ambiguous and fading memory. There is repertory, of course, but casts change. No two performances are ever the same. Dancing, in its cardinal evanescence, physicality, and intensity, is, perhaps even more than spectator sports, the least handy motion for a watcher to fix. And for whom is 'dance criticism' written? For the small portion of an audience who may have both seen the identical performance and read the corresponding notice? For an 'informed public,' which is a smaller, opinionated segment of the 'dance public'? For 'the record'—or to satisfy the policy of popular coverage, however perfunctory?
Review, 2696 words
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