To secure their future, many girls hope for a donation to be made to the ballet to become a mistress to one of the many French businessmen. Even without injury, a ballerina's career can be short-lived. However, her dream is not without its darker side. A student of dance from early childhood, working for her classes, she has been driven by a dream to establish herself as a member of society and the financial future for her family. Alexandrie, an ambitious and talented ifarm girl from Southern France, has auditioned and been accepted as a ballerina into the Paris Opera Ballet. It is the Belle Époque ('beautiful era') in France, a period in French history occurring between 1871 and the beginning of WWI, a time of optimism and when literature, music, theater and the visual arts flourished. I suppose she was meant to be pure, idealistic and ambitious, but to me she just came across as self-righteous and self-centered.Īll told, it was ok, maybe my expectations were too high. My biggest problem though was the main character, who I didn't like from beginning to end, and therefore didn't care what would happen to her. Also, I found it baffling why the author would change the narrative from past to present tense somewhere on page 105, without any reason. The writing was a bit patchy, well-written in some parts, rather high school in others. Overall, I don't think Wagner captured the time and place very well, beyond mentioning the famous names of the day. Patrons of course chose mistresses from among the dancers, often arranged by the girls' mothers, however the idea the ballet master of the Paris Opera acted as a pimp and women over a certain age were forced to do this if they wished to remain at the ballet is ridiculous. However, she took other liberties which I feel are way over the top and completely unnecessary, such as the frequently used line about ballerinas who turn 25 having to become prostitutes with the opera functioning as some sort of high-class brothel. Wagner added (invented) incidents that would explain some of his traits and I thought it fitted in well with the story.

The best part for me was actually the characterization of Degas, which seems to be true to life and was done in a convincing way.

I had expected so much more from this book, although I expect to be in the minority with my opinion. She models for him for years, resulting in some of his most famous works, yet in the end has to decide what she wants her future to be. She falls in love with Edgar Degas who is a frequent visitor at the ballet. Alexandrie is a peasant girl who, after years of ballet lessons, joins the Paris Opera Ballet, with hopes of becoming prima ballerina, as well as the mistress of a wealthy patron in order to secure the financial future of her family.

Japin degas