A Dance Like Starlight: One Ballerina’s Dream by Kristy Dempsey (review)

Our young narrator wants to dance ballet, like the girls at the ballet school where her mother takes care of the costumes. The encouragement from the ballet master (who permits her to join the lessons, “even though I can’t perform onstage with white girls”) allows her to hope that she could break the stage’s color line and become a dancer. She’s utterly thrilled to find a role model in Janet Collins, an elegant African-American ballerina performing for the first time at the Metropolitan Opera House, and when her mother manages to get them tickets, Collins’ artistry and success convince the girl that she too can have a future in ballet. The story is slow to start, focusing in abstract and sentimental terms on the narrator’s dreams for too long before articulating the problem; the conclusion also will leave audiences wondering whether the girl’s hope ever was fulfilled. More involving, however, is the girl’s keen love of ballet and her joy at discovering a pioneer who proves her dream possible, a joy enhanced by the glamour of a grownup night out at a magnificent performance. Cooper’s smoky mixed-media artwork has a subtle and appropriate echo of Degas in scenes of dancers on stage and smartly dressed 1950s audience members, and the protagonist is vividly realistic, a talented down-to-earth girl rather than an ethereal sylph. A note explains more about Collins, the first African-American performer at the Met (in 1951, four years before Marian Anderson), but more of her story would be welcome—a possibility for a new project, perhaps?