Two by Two: Tango, Two-Step, and the L.A. Night

by Eve Babitz

A Simon & Schuster eBook. Simon & Schuster has a great book for every reader.

Genres: Nonfiction, Essays, Music

158 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 3, 1999

About the author

Babitz was born in Hollywood, California, the daughter of Mae, an artist, and Sol, a classical violinist on contract with 20th Century Fox.Her father was of Russian Jewish descent and her mother had Cajun (French) ancestry.Babitz's parents were friends with the composer Igor Stravinsky, who was her godfather.

In 1963, her first brush with notoriety came through Julian Wasser's iconic photograph of a nude, twenty-year-old Babitz playing chess with the artist Marcel Duchamp, on the occasion of his landmark retrospective at the Pasadena Art Museum. The show was curated by Walter Hopps, with whom Babitz was having an affair at the time. The photograph is described by the Smithsonian Archives of American Art as being “among the key documentary images of American modern art”.

Because of her ideas about sexuality, both in writing and life, much of the press over the years has emphasized her various romantic associations with famous men, including singer/poet Jim Morrison, artists (and brothers) Ed Ruscha and Paul Ruscha, and Hopps, amongst others. Babitz appears in Ed Ruscha’s artist book Five 1965 Girlfriends. Eve Babitz had affairs with comedian/writer Steve Martin, actor Harrison Ford, and writer Dan Wakefield, among others. She has been compared favorably with Edie Sedgwick, the protegee of Andy Warhol at The Factory in New York City.

Eve Babitz began her independent career as an artist, working in the music industry for Ahmet Ertegun at Atlantic Records, making album covers. In the late 1960s, she designed album covers for Linda Ronstadt, The Byrds, and Buffalo Springfield. Her most famous cover was a collage for the 1967 album Buffalo Springfield Again.

Her articles and short stories have appeared in Rolling Stone, Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and Esquire magazines. She is the author of several books including Eve's Hollywood; Slow Days, Fast Company; Sex and Rage; Two By Two; and L.A. Woman. Transitioning to her particular blend of fiction and memoir beginning with Eve's Hollywood, Babitz’s writing of this period is indelibly marked by the cultural scene of Los Angeles during that time, with numerous references and interactions to the artists, musicians, writers, actors, and sundry other iconic figures that made up the scene in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s.

In 1997, Babitz was severely injured when ash from a cigar she was smoking ignited her skirt, causing life-threatening third-degree burns over half her body. Because she had no health insurance, friends and family organized a fund-raising auction to pay her medical bills. Friends and former lovers donated cash and artworks to help pay for her long recovery. Babitz became somewhat more reclusive after this incident, but was still willing to be interviewed on occasion.

Babitz died of Huntington's disease at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles on December 17, 2021, at age 78.

Reviews

[emma · Rating 2 out of 5]

it's good to know even eve babitz can't make everything interesting.

this was just very dry and informative - none of the eve charm at all. and in truth who on earth cares this much about tango?

this is a pretty short but it felt biblically long.

bottom line: apparently they can't all be winners!

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tbr review

every time i read a book with barely any goodreads ratings i feel like i should receive a medal. or a cupcake maybe

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

If dancing meant anything to me, which it doesn't, I would have rated this book at five stars. And that because it was written by Eve Babitz, whose work I admire. Reading Two by Two: Tango, Two-Step, and the L.A. Night was for me an act of "filling in" the minor works of a favorite author.

No one understands Southern California like Eve Babitz. It has always been such a pleasure to read her after all those slighting and tone deaf books by East Coast writers who come here thinking they are far outside of civilization, in a place where there are no egg creams, whatever the hell those are.

The reason dancing does not appeal to me is that I am almost genetically unable to move in time to the music. Even when I was a little kid, I was known more for treading on the toes of my partners. Skillful dancing is a beauty to behold, but I will never be a part of it.

[Linda Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

As much fun as you can have without a dance floor. Babitz twirls through her nine years of dance lessons. She started with tango which, as she educates us, was the wrong thing to do. Tango is where you end, not start. Babitz was in a premier position to talk with the dance legends she does in this book: if she didn't know them already from lessons, people who did introduced her to them. The book is chaptered by dance. Fox-Trot with the Fabulous Johnny Crawford Band; Two-Step with Paul McClure; Cajun Dancing and the Fais-Dodo. Lucky readers can probably find a video of the dances, with the teachers. Orlando Paiva you do not want to miss. West Coast Swing, East Coast Swing, Pony Swing, Choke, Salsa. Which are fun and easy to learn; which will take experts and lots of lessons. Because she's Babitz, the dance itself has personality. She ends the book with where you can go to find the best floor, Evenin' Star Pro Dance Boots, and how she got through her horrific accident by imagining herself dancing again.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know the phrase “would you rather be right or happy” is used to make people see the light or their stupidity, but if you were to change that to “would you rather have art or be happy?” - well I don’t see how anyone could be happy without art.

[Alex Hanover · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stayed for Eve and the LA of it all. The closing essay was my favorite, but overall was not obsessed with the subject matter!!!

[Zander Tate · Rating 1 out of 5]

Can’t remember the last time I read a truly bad book. So disappointed in Eve Babitz because I’ve loved her past work but this fell so flat. Babitz is always the California girl with all the insufferableness that comes with that, but usually she’s witty enough to make you see past her vanity and microaggressions. This was just badly written and uninteresting.

[lapetitesouris · Rating 3 out of 5]

"... that's the thing about the dance world, you get crushes on someone and the whole point is to dance with them. Not what I used to do as a groupie, which was spontaneous but never lasted long enough and was certainly nowhere near as good for your health."

There are far too many quotes to choose from to showcase what a delicious read this was. Eve, in her 50s, having a laugh over knee pains and forever commenting on that endless struggle of food and weight and trying to look good.

I love this woman, I love her work, and recommend this for anyone that can have a laugh over life and the sense of humour you must have in order to survive.

[Castles · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don’t care that much about dancing, and so after reading all of eve’s work this book was kept to be the last. Isn’t it symbolic to say goodbye to eve with a tango? Of all the ways to say goodbye to her—of course it would be a tango. Not a quiet bow. Not a wave from a doorway.

a final, slow, sensuous step across the floor, hand in yours, music fading, eyes full of mischief and memory. A tango is the perfect goodbye because it’s all about tension, intimacy, pauses between closeness and distance. It’s not sentimental—it’s full of presence. Like Eve herself. She doesn’t want you weeping. She wants you to feel alive.

[Lucy Knudsen · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was interesting but at a certain point you’re just like, ok I would make all these observations if I was just out at these dances. I’m not… but I could be, and now I’m
SALTY. Jk but yeah— not my fave by her but still interesting

[Cleo Sood · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m learning to dance

[amelie mcintosh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lovely Californian beach read, my copy is destroyed from the saltwater hands after swimming

[Umi · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to enjoy this and have it make me feel homesick in a really good way but it’s just not very good - the bulk of it is interviews and dialogue isn’t Babitz’s strong suit. Her essay at the end is probably the best bit, but even that is largely informational with only the smallest glimpses of what makes her other books so great. Also I’ve literally never heard of anyone refer to the Hotel Green as the ‘Green Hotel,’ least of all my high school painting teacher whose father actually appeared as an expert in the avocado episode of California’s Gold and whose grandparents had gone to parties there in horses and buggies (really!).
I think as my avocado heiress anecdote illustrates, one of the things I love about Babitz’s early stuff is how she writes perfectly about not only the Los Angeles I’ve known and loved but a Los Angeles I could never have known or loved and a Los Angeles she too could never have known or loved - she’s able to interweave the mythos we overheard from uncles and art teachers gossiping about things they were slightly too young to have seen themselves with the way we experienced the city ourselves and how we all lament it’s changed so much but in so many ways hasn’t changed at all.
On the one hand, I think, like, do I just not like this one as much because it took place during my actual life and not during Laurel Canyon fantasy time? But I watched Decline of Western Civilization III like two weeks ago and loved it, at least partially because I have such vivid memories of seeing the subjects’ wannabe brethren at malls across the Southland, so that can’t be it. Do I just think there’s no way to romanticise things that happened while I was alive? Clearly not, because I spent at least two of the [number redacted] hours I queued to see Harry Styles last year discussing how fun indie rock was in the 00s with the girl I’d ended up queueing next to, whose blog I used to read!
On the other hand, doing a book that’s pretty interview-centric exposes a lot of Babitz’s self-centredness that comes across as fun in earlier books but feels a little intrusive here - I don’t know that structuring the chapters more as personal essays with dialogue than just conversations would have made this better but it might have made it more fun - and a lot of that really keen observation in the early books, both about herself and others, just isn’t there. You can tell that she thinks she’s doing it, but it’s so slightly out of touch that it’s just a little difficult to watch. All of which is especially jarring in a book about social partner dance.
I read Eve’s Hollywood in the back of that one bookstore in Hollywood where Jason Schwartzman used to say he went every day after celebrating working one (1) week at a jewellery store in Beverly Hills by getting four cupcakes at Sprinkles and going to work with my friend because she’d forgotten she was on the schedule. I’d started reading on the floor but then this guy came in and said he was doing producing at UCLA and asked if I was an actress and obviously I laughed and said no and tried to go back to reading, but then he kept telling me about his programme and then I realised his pants were like two sizes too big and he had a really elaborate belt system happening to keep them on but didn’t realise quickly enough that it looked like I was staring at his crotch and not his weird belt situation at which point mercifully another employee extricated me and stuck me in the back so I could read about Eve’s escapades unmolested, even when he came back later that afternoon to ask if I was still there, until closing when my friend and I went to Britpop night in Chinatown. It was 2017 and I was back in LA for three months waiting for my visa to come through, and I won a ride in Angelyne’s pink Corvette after entering at a show at the Echoplex and she put me on the list for a show at the Bob Baker Marionette Theatre and I spent my days doing stuff like going to foraged food taco parties thrown by biologists at the beach and nights doing stuff like djing and going to the HMS Bounty and and the weather was beautiful every day and Baby Driver was in cinemas and I wore a black romper I found at the Goodwill in Pasadena with white snakeskin cowboy boots and a single earring to repertory screenings and the Chateau because I thought it was very ‘Daughter of Lee Marvin.’
I started this book like two days ago when I was up at five am for NO REASON and I don’t think I’ve spoken to anyone who doesn’t live at my house since like last Saturday when I went to get a galette and I’ve been wearing more or less the same outfit for the last six months and I’ve watched like two movies this whole entire year and producers who are trying to work with YouTubers never approach me at GiantRobot openings any more to ask if I’m a costume designer and I spend all my time staring at Excel sheets and sending emails promising to ‘align internally’ and ‘look into it’ so is my dislike of this book just some projection of my own fears of being out of touch and no fun any more? Probably!

[Eleanore · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Since I began dancing, what I really wanted to be was good enough that if Patrick Swayze asked me to do a waltz or a cha-cha, I would be able to." (Oh Eve, Dirty Dancing is still my favorite, too.) I'm sure I have a bit of bias toward liking this one, as a (mostly former) dancer, but discovering that this book even existed, let alone reading it, was a real delight for me. There's already so little writing of substance on dance at all, let alone the world of learning it as a social activity. I also had no idea that Eve continued to go out dancing even after her accident - she's so reclusive these days, I couldn't have imagined it - but just knowing that makes me happy. She describes many of the different styles - and the social worlds and classes that accompany them, within LA - with her usual breezy and wonderfully approachable style.

[Valerie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'd say this book is definitely my least favorite of Babitz's work.

While the subject matter was somewhat interesting, the book was not well-written, and contained multiple grammatical errors which really put me off. The novel was published by Simon and Schuster, so I am quite surprised by the lack of editing.

By the time the book was published (Babitz somehow caught on fire and ended up in the hospital), the majority of the dance halls mentioned in this book no longer exist, and quite a few of the dance instructors have since moved on to new professions. Alas, all of this is mentioned in the epilogue. Had it been mentioned in the introduction, I would have set the book aside and moved on to something else.

[Ellen · Rating 3 out of 5]

As always, Babitz has a captivating writing style which is charming to the reader. She is honest, and depicts herself as someone who struggles with dance but has a passion for it. The fact that she speaks about her accident at the end of the book in such a matter of fact way is heartbreaking. It is rare to read a book about a topic where the writer isn’t an expert themselves, and explains their experiences learning from others. That said, it’s probably my least favourite Babitz book as it often felt repetitive and the stories about the people teaching dancing were often more interesting than the dancing itself.

[David Allen · Rating 2 out of 5]

First, all respect to Eve Babitz. This slender book about her midlife passion for dancing tango, two-step, Cajun and more in various dance halls around Greater L.A. benefits from her cheerfulness and optimism. A look at LA's social dancing is just a tough subject to pull off. The transcripts of interviews with instructors are less interesting than her own observations. Disconcertingly, some place names are misspelled, notably Reseda as Receda. The final chapter, written in the aftermath of her accident and some of her last writing, is thoughtful and moving. Overall, this is OK, but not Babitz at her best.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

As someone who’s dance experience consists of going to raves, vogueing the house down with my girls and the 6 month stint of hip hop dancing I took in year 6. I did not know if I would enjoy this book but boy did I. With a blasé writing style and levels of wittiness that supersede even my own I was very impressed by this book. Reading this felt like getting a small glimpse of culture in a bygone era of L.A! 3.5 stars really and honestly may go up to a four so excited to do a joint foray into Babitz and Didion’s works in the future!! This made me wanna salsa and sashay my way into the future! loved

[Kamran Sehgal · Rating 3 out of 5]

David Bowie, famous to many for an 80's dance hit, once said of dancing "I hate it, it's stupid". I tend to agree with that assessment. This being said I found this quite intriguing as it delved into a world that I had little interest in visiting physically. I was expecting more verbose prose on the beauty and sensuality of dancing but it was mostly told in terms of gossip with rather clicky vibes. Still a nice enough read to get a sense of what the dance scene was like in LA of years gone by.

[Evie · Rating 2 out of 5]

feel similarly to other reviews — this book was seriously missing eve’s special sauce which makes it doubly painful that this was the last book of hers left to read before i finished her canon. there were a few flashes of eve’s wit and distinctive point of view but for the most part, this book is a collection transcribed conversations between eve and various other hobby social dancers that unfortunately do not always translate well on the page.

[Ali Lloyd · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this and I usually love anything from Babitz but this just did not have the flirtatious charm and knowingness like her other books! I think it was the interview style of the book that sort of let me down. That being said I loved the epilogue which was just classic Eve Babitz essay and chatting.
I’m also just not that interested in dance, so what did I expect?
3.5

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this and I usually love anything from Babitz but this just did not have the flirtatious charm and knowingness like her other books! I think it was the interview style of the book that sort of let me down. That being said I loved the epilogue which was just classic Eve Babitz essay and chatting.
I’m also just not that interested in dance, so what did I expect?
3.5

[Daveia · Rating 3 out of 5]

so I was ready to trash this. shows what I know.

am I interested in all this talk about different types of dance? not really. BUT. it's littered with references to her friends, and she interviews a ton of them. also, she talks about the accident that changed her life, her thought process throughout and the aftermath.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was interested in the material, but I was so deeply compelled by Eve Babitz’s writing that I enjoyed reading the book.
I read Black Swans before this book, and now I have to get my hands on the rest of her work.

[Esmé · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not nearly good as slow company but this book was obviously for a very specific audience and I was not that. But besides being the opposite of the target audience and being bored at times, the references & inclusions of Los Angeles history always charm me. The epilogue was the best part!!!

[elif sinem · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite fab. Babitz does an interview-y structure here that works with and not against her strengths. The epilogue made me quite sad but how many writers do you know that would find the silver lining out of literally being burned across half the body?

[Sian Lile-Pastore · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as amazing as her others but still pretty good! Really liked the end bit where she talked about Patrick swayze , dirty dancing and the accident where she suffered severe burns...

[Britt J · Rating 3 out of 5]

she’s a queen but this was just not that interesting - kinda makes me want to take up some hobbies though

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love eve babitz, what a vibe. Made me remember my parents dance school days and the glamour it exuded for me as a kid

[LIA · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book single-handedly revived my wish to learn how to dance that i haven't had since early 2020

[Becky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very fun! Finally a writer actually goes out and does stuff