Tango Nuevo

Dedication Page

For my parents, who sent me to dance class in the first place. And for Steve, to many more years of dancing together. Merritt book.indb 7 8/23/12 11:23 AM Merritt book.indb 8 8/23/12 11:23 AM Oh this is the animal that never was. ἀ ey hadn’t seen one; but just the same, they loved its graceful movements, and the way it stood looking at them calmly, with clear eyes. It had not been. But for them, it appeared in all its purity. ἀ ey left space enough. And in the space hollowed out by their love it stood up all at once and didn’t need existence. ἀ ey nourished it, not with grain, but with the mere possibility of being. And finally this gave it so much power that from its forehead a horn grew. One horn. It drew near to a virgin, white, gleaming— and was, inside the mirror and in her. Rainer Maria Rilke, ἀ e Sonnets to Orpheus II, 4 ἀ e tango can be debated, and we have debates over it, but it still encloses, as does all that which is truthful, a secret. Jorge Luis Borges, “A History of the Tango” (1999) Merritt book.indb 9 8/23/12 11:23 AM Merritt book.indb 10 8/23/12 11:23 AM ...