There is something fearfully strengthening about cutting free even if the ties bandage the heart itself.
AGNES DE MILLEThere is something fearfully strengthening about cutting free even if the ties bandage the heart itself.
AGNES DE MILLEI learned three important things in college-to use a library, to memorize quickly and visually, to drop asleep at any time given a horizontal surface and fifteen minutes.
AGNES DE MILLEBut remember that intent is everything. One does not just jump, one lifts into the air, one rises.
AGNES DE MILLEThey are just a lot of isolated individuals jiggling in a kind of self-hypnosis and dancing with others only to remind themselves that we are not completely alone in this world.
AGNES DE MILLEEmily Dickinson provided four or more alternates for every word; Beethoven wrestled with endings to the point of exhaustion; in our day Jerome Robbins and his lack of decision are a byword in the dance profession.
AGNES DE MILLETheater people are always pining and agonizing because they’re afraid that they’ll be forgotten. And in America they’re quite right. They will be.
AGNES DE MILLETo make up a dance, I still need, as I needed then, a pot of tea, walking space, privacy and an idea.
AGNES DE MILLEWe can’t stand silence, because silence includes thinking. And if we thought, we would have to face ourselves.
AGNES DE MILLELiving is a form of not being sure, not know what next or how… The artists never entirely knows.
AGNES DE MILLEDancers don’t get invited to visit people. It is assumed a boy dancer will run off with the spoons and a girl with the head of the house.
AGNES DE MILLEModern dancers give a sinister portent about our times. The dancers don’t even look at one another.
AGNES DE MILLEWho am I?, the artist asks. And he devotes his whole life to finding out.
AGNES DE MILLENo white man uses his feet the way an Indian does. He talks to the earth.
AGNES DE MILLEMany other women have kicked higher, balanced longer, or turned faster. These are poor substitutes for passion.
AGNES DE MILLESo that we don’t go mad in the leisure, we have color TV. So that there will never, never, be a moment of silence, we have radio and Muzak.
AGNES DE MILLEI want one word on my tombstone – dancer.
AGNES DE MILLE