THE last drawing in this book is of Nijinsky as Narcisse, and if Narcisse had been a pas seul by Nijinsky I am sure that there would have been more to praise in it. For once, the mosaic was all wrong, and so the centre piece could not be all right. I have read enthusiastic accounts of "L'Apres-midi d'un Faune," which Nijinsky himself arranged, making Debussy's music the vehicle for a display of Greek poses, and from Nijinsky's personal performance in "Narcisse" I believe it to be possible that he has succeeded in doing, in "L'AprÈs-midi de un Faune," what Bakst failed to do in "Narcisse. ' ' When, at the end of the ballet, that colossal stage narcissus was jerked up from the stage pool, and the limelight was turned on it, I regretfully saw in that light a limitation in the Russian art. They could not interpret the tranquil repose, the immanent beauty of Greek ideas.

Original

The whole treatment of the exquisite story of the youth who fell in love with his own beauty, and was drowned seeking to come near its reflection, was heavy-handed, even a little barbarous and ugly. And all the grave movements imprisoned in stone and marble by the sculptors of ancient Greece, all the joyous silhouettes on Greek vases, seemed to remain remote, and secure from the conquest of the devouring Russian, restlessly seeking material for his ballets in all nations and all times. I had a sudden seizure of distrust; it was as though the disdain of the Greek had sapped the foundations of my belief in the justness of the praises lavished on the new dance; but then memories of gestures, colors, bounding movements, freedom of expression given by perfection of technique, came crowding pell-mell into my mind. The frown on a cold marble forehead could not extinguish my joy in the flame of life which burns so ardently in the work of the Russian ballet.