The Unmaking of a Dancer: An Unconventional Life

by Joan Brady

Brady uses the familiar structure of a ballet class to structure her narration. Her portrait of the jealousy and competition that young dancers feel, that sense of having to mold themselves to fit a company is frightening. like flag

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Biography

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1982

About the author

Joan Brady is an American-British writer. She is the first woman and American to win the Whitbread Book of the Year Award for her novel Theory of War.
She was married to writer Dexter Masters and has a son who is also an author: Alexander Masters.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Reviews

[Valerie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the way Brady used the familiar structure of a ballet class to structure her narration. Her portrait of the jealousy and competition that young dancers feel, that sense of having to mold themselves to fit a company was frightening.

[Jenne · Rating 3 out of 5]

A great read, with lots of enjoyably gross details about ballet training (you do not want to know what is going on inside those toe shoes). The end was kind of a letdown though, but what can you expect from real life?

[Lizzie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've always liked stories and memoirs about people in environments like ballet, monasteries - the cloistered world of striving, the fascinating details - and this was satisfying. But the blurb on my edition really misrepresents the book. Yes, it's about her years in ballet, and how she eventually left it, but also about her unconventional family and her power struggles with her mother, who was quite a piece of work.

[Jordan Taylor · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Unmaking of a Dancer: An Unconventional Life, by Joan Brady is a memoir by a dancer-turned-writer who shares about her time as a ballerina and growing up in an unconventional family. Brady is a gifted writer, effortlessly pulling meaning from her experiences and stringing together the seemingly most minute of details to craft a moving narrative of her life. The ballerina in me found the most compelling parts of her memoir to be the epigraphs at the start of each chapter, which explain a ballet move and its purpose. The epigraphs begin with a 𝘱𝘭𝘪é (the first move in a ballet class) and end with a 𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 (the last move in a ballet class). Unsurprisingly, the content of the chapters symbolically align with the epigraphs. I was impressed and captivated by Brady’s accounts as a dancer, although at times I was taken aback by what she accurately describes as an “unconventional” life. Still, I believe this memoir holds some powerful literary merit.

[Phyllis · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was very interested to read this story of a ballet dancer. I was a ballet dancer in my youth; I began at age 8 through age 13. I stopped when my family moved to a different state. Everything that Joan Brady wrote brought back those memories of the ballet experience. The book focuses quite a bit on her personal and family life but the parts I was riveted by were the teachers in the classes of all the important dancers and instructors that I had heard of many years ago. And, since I knew ballet, I was interested in the intricacies of classroom work, steps, dances, music, etc. It brought so much back to me. I was amazed at her ability to get back into shape in her late 30's.

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars because I enjoyed the first half. But midway through the rest I started skipping pages. I think now I am less interested in ballet than I was before I started.
This woman is arrogant to the extreme. She is incredibly scathing of lots of fellow dancers, and seems obsessed with pointing out their physical flaws. Today she would be quite rightly accused of body shaming. She also never misses an opportunity to record all the compliments she's given, even if the source is herself. If I was sat next to her at a dinner party, I'd defo change seats.

[Katharine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating memoir charting the author’s ballet training and the pressures on young dancers. It also deals obliquely with the rivalry between herself and her mother for the love of her eventual husband. An interesting read.

[Morgan Molin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Found it hard to connect with any of the "characters", but otherwise nice writing. If I'm being honest, I took me a lot longer to finish this book than I thought it would - the nice writing wasn't enough to hold my attention.

[Surreysmum · Rating 3 out of 5]

[These notes were made in 1984:]. This has less to do with the dance world and more to do with a rather soapy love triangle between Brady, her husband, and her mother, than you might think. Nonetheless, it contains some fine, detailed observation and some rather trenchant comments about the Christensen brothers in San Francisco, and about Balanchine and ABT in New York. It comes down rather harder on the San Francisco "style" than it does upon New York, but there is throughout an almost bitter and yet somehow distanced disdain for the intense jealousies and petty backstage meannesses of the ballet world. Brady does not spare herself - she portrays herself as just as bad as the rest of them. A very interesting book, if only because the woman can write something other than breathless fannery!

[Super Amanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazing book that transports you to the world of Berkeley California in the 1950's and the fear of the Red Scare and how it seeped into the lives of countless innocent idealist, then to NYC and the draconian fist of Balanchine and later the UK and redemption, finding a sense of self within your life as artist. What a life Joan Brady has led. NOT to be missed!!

[Nora Blue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joan Brady's book tells an unusual life story. She suffered from extreme ambivalence about her dancing and debilitating stage fright. Although she was determined and conscientious in her classes and improved, they brought her little support or relief from other worries.