The Travelling Dancer

Abstract Focusing on Petipa’s professional life before his arrival in Russia, this chapter deals with his time in the French provincial theatres of Nantes and Bordeaux, describing the conditions there, listing his early ballets and roles, outlining the importance of national or folk dance on the ballet stage. It follow this with his adventures—on stage and off—in Spain; he fought a duel and eloped with a young Spanish noblewoman, events described in his memoirs that appear, according to the evidence, to have really happened. The chapter also touches upon two other members of the Petipa family: his brother Lucien, star of the Paris Opera; and his father Jean, an eminent ballet master, who briefly joined a company on tour to New York.