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I wish you would read Goldner rather than relying on another reviewer's citations, while at the same apologizing for doing so. Surely going to the original, the source itself, is an ethical imperative in critical practice.
I guess you'd need to obtain the book.

Thanks for yr energetic efforts to cover so many performances!

max

Apollinaire responds: yeah, I should read the book. I even want to (hence requesting a copy). I was just trying to give you something, but, yeah, probably should have kept it to "It didn't sound very promising, but I'd have to see for myself."

I note that you seldom comment on other critics' writings. Thus the new book by Nancy Goldner - reviewed by Alastair Macaulay in the NYT, hasn't been mentioned. Wld you consider it to be a good reference source for yr readers?

Apollinaire responds: Oh, I think I've written more about other critics' work than anyone else I know--grouchily usually, which is too bad. I asked for a copy of the Goldner book, but it seems to have gotten lost in the mail, so I can't tell you what I think.

I do know that Goldner has been watching Balanchine ballets for a very long time, so I'm sure she has insight into them. On the other hand, what Macaulay quoted did not make her case. Her effusion of ellipses (i.e., ...), so she wouldn't seem to be nailing a meaning to a ballet, suggests that she doesn't entirely know her own mind or method as a critic. That is, if you're going to give a reading, as we call an interpretation, then do it. If you think this shouldn't be done--that dances don't mean, they just are, to paraphrase some wretched poet whose name is currently escaping me--then do something else. But don't do the first, then deny it.

The passages that Macaulay swooned over seemed to me to be very standard-issue readings of the ballets. But that may be Macaulay more than Goldner herself. Sometimes critics feel they ought to like something, but actually don't, and they betray their real feelings in the passages they quote, etc.

Thanks so much for writing, Max. Let me know what you think if you do read the book.