Introduction Origins of Ballet Dance in the 18th Century  18th Century Satire Romantic Ballet  The Cult of the Ballerina The Pas de Quatre Marie Taglioni Classical Ballet 20th Century Revolution  Diaghilev Ballet Diaghilev Ballet after 1918 Nijinsky Anna Pavlova The Establishment of British Ballet  Ballet Rambert The Royal Ballet The Royal Ballet post 1945

Marie Taglioni in La Sylphide

The great Romantic ballerinas were idolised throughout Europe. Marie Taglioni danced in Paris, St Petersburg, London and Italy and Fanny Elssler even toured North America. The rivalry between Elssler and Taglioni and their supporters was intense. Theophile Gautier, a ballet critic and an Elssler fan, snidely described Taglioni as a Christian dancer (implying she was rather cold), while he proclaimed that Elssler was a pagan dancer (implying that she was sexy).

Listen to the song 'Reminiscences of Fanny Elssler' by Ferdinand Waldmuller. [Download]

The Corsair, 1844

The popular image of the Romantic ballerina as an otherworldly, ethereal being was portrayed in lithographs. These were popular before photography. They showed ballerinas poised on flowers, reclining on clouds and floating through the air. Many ballerinas did perform these feats on stage, but with more than a little help from stage technology.

Fanny Cerrito and Carlotta Grisi were two other stars of the Romantic ballet. Click on their object stories to discover more about them.

Fanny Cerrito: 'La Lituana'

Carlotta Grisi as Giselle

Clara Webster

Unlike other European countries, England never produced a great Romantic ballerina. The talented Clara Webster, who London critics prophesied would be the first great English ballerina, had her career cut tragically short when her dress caught fire on stage. England did not have a national ballet school attached to a major opera house, although several London theatres provided dance training.

Clara Webster

Louise Fleury

The Decline of Romantic Ballet

In 1847, the soprano opera singer Jenny Lind made a sensational London debut. The fashionable London audiences had a new star and lost interest in ballet. Ballet survived in pantomime, opera and the music halls and by the 1890s ballet was a main attraction on the variety bills at the rival Alhambra and Empire Theatres in Leicester Square.

Louise Farebrother as Abdullah

Jullien's 'Original Polka'

Read more about Dance in Popular Theatre

Lithographs

Lithography is a form of printing invented in Germany and developed in England in the early 19th century. It was the first commercially viable method of mass colour printing. The design was drawn in wax or crayon on to a porous lithographic stone; the stone was washed and inked with a roller; the waxed drawing retained the ink and a print was taken from the stone. Early lithographs were hand coloured. Colour printing meant using a different stone for each separate colour.