![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.acu.edu\/aculibraryacquisitions\/files\/2020\/01\/IMG_3967-368x490.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
For more than four hundred years, the art of ballet has stood at the center of Western civilization. Its traditions serve as a record of our past. Lavishly illustrated and beautifully told, Apollo\u2019s Angels\u2014the first cultural history of ballet ever written\u2014is a groundbreaking work. From ballet\u2019s origins in the Renaissance and the codification of its basic steps and positions under France\u2019s Louis XIV, the art form wound its way through the courts of Europe, from Paris and Milan to Vienna and St. Petersburg. In the twentieth century, Russian \u00e9migr\u00e9 dancers taught their art to a generation in the United States and in Western Europe, setting off a new and radical transformation of dance. Jennifer Homans, a historian, critic, and former professional ballerina, wields a knowledge of dance born of dedicated practice.<\/span><\/p>\n “Here is a book of immense ambition\u2014a one-volume history of ballet\u2014and of considerable accomplishment. Jennifer Homans, whom we know primarily as\u00a0The New Republic’s\u00a0<\/em>provocative dance critic, shows herself to be both dogged and graceful as a historian\u2014a rare and welcome combination of qualities.” The New York Review of Books<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For more than four hundred years, the art of ballet has stood at the center of Western civilization. Its traditions serve as a record of our past. Lavishly illustrated and beautifully told, Apollo\u2019s Angels\u2014the first cultural history of ballet ever … Continue reading