Did they or didn't they? The brief marriage of Katherine of Aragon and Arthur, Prince of Wales

“Willoughby, bring me a cup of ale, for I have been this night in the midst of Spain.”

~Arthur, Prince of Wales, to his steward on the morning of November 15, 1501.

“. . . as intact and uncorrupt as when [she] emerged from [her] mother’s womb.”
~Katherine of Aragon’s assertion regarding the non-consummation of her marriage to Arthur

After two years of negotiations, by the treaty of Medina del Campo, ratified by Henry VII on September 23, 1490, his four-year-old son Arthur, the Prince of Wales and heir to England’s throne (1486-1502) was contracted in marriage to Catalina, or Katherine (1485-1536), the youngest daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain.

Katherine of Aragon (1485-1536)

Finally, on May 14, 1499, Arthur married Katherine by proxy at Tickhill Manor. But further international wrangling over Katherine’s dowry delayed her departure for England, and she did not arrive there until October 2, 1501.

On November 14, Katherine and Arthur, clad all in white, were united at St. Paul’s Cathedral in a three-hour ceremony, which followed the reading of the appropriate papal dispensations and the formal terms of the marriage, as well as the exchange of the first installment of Katherine’s dowry.

A raised, six-hundred-foot runway, covered in red cloth trimmed with gilt nails had been erected from the west doors of the church all the way to the chancel, where the nuptial mass was conducted on a raised stage. The musicians were stationed in the soaring vaults, which gave the illusion that their resounding melodies emanated from on high.

The bride was considered a beauty, blessed with abundant auburn hair, gray eyes, dainty hands and feet, and the damasked pink-and-white complexion that was so prized in England. But the English had never seen an ensemble quite like her wedding attire. With her skirts stretched over her Spanish farthingale—a horizontal cage tied about her hips—Katherine resembled a ship of state as she sailed along the walkway, high above the crowd. Her white silk veil, or mantilla, fluttered to her waist, weighed down by a jeweled border two fingers’ wide.

Arthur, Prince of Wales (1486-1502)

Outside the cathedral the wine flowed freely from a conduit—royal largesse to the cheering throngs—as the bells of London pealed. After the ceremony the teenage newlyweds, “both lusty and amorous,” were conveyed to Baynard’s castle in a grand procession where a sumptuous feast awaited them, as did a public, though strictly ceremonial, bridal bed.

Preparing the actual bed of state was a production number involving several participants who were honored to get the assignment, including the yeoman of the guard whose job it was to roll “up and down” the litter of straw that formed the bed’s base layer. This brave soul was not merely matting the rushes; he was searching for hidden weapons.

After what amounted to a stag night, replete with bawdy songs to get the groom in the proper frame of mind to perform his conjugal duty, Arthur was escorted to the great bed where Katherine was already waiting for him. The bishops blessed the couple and wished them many years of fruitful life together, then departed and left the newlywed teens to nature.

Or not—depending on whom you asked. And depending on the circumstances in which you asked and how many days, weeks, or years it was from the wedding night itself.

Arthur’s steward recalled his fifteen-year-old master boasting of his sexual prowess on the morning after the wedding night, “Willoughby, bring me a cup of ale, for I have been this night in the midst of Spain.” Other witnesses heard this remark as well as Arthur’s exhortation, “Masters, it is good pastime to have a wife.” It could have been no more than macho swagger—but why? Those who saw the young couple together noticed a genuine attraction between them.

And Katherine had a rock-solid sense of duty. Her marriage negotiations had been long in the making; now that she was wed to the future king of England, her job was only half-accomplished. To permanently cement Spain’s alliance with England and fulfill her parents’ diplomatic aims, she had to get pregnant and deliver an heir. Katherine spent the day after the wedding in solitude, receiving only the king’s messenger who delivered the sovereign’s heartiest felicitations—on the consummation of the union, one assumes. And the following day, she went to St. Paul’s to see her husband and father-in-law give thanks to God “that so prosperously His Goodness had suffered everything of this laudable [marriage] to be brought to its most laudable conclusion [the getting of children].” True, she could have just been playing along, knowing it was expected of her, and if there had been a problem in the bedroom she dared not disclose a word of it.

Katherine’s duenna Doña Elvira, a woman with her own political agenda, insisted—and Katherine reiterated as much years later—that the conjugal visits remained chaste. However, it’s also possible that everything went just fine in the boudoir. William Thomas, Arthur’s Groom of the Privy Chamber and one of his most intimate body servants, was in charge of preparing the prince for his visits to the marriage bed. Thomas “made [Arthur] ready to bed . . . and conducted him clad in his night gown unto the Princess’s bedchamber door often and sundry times . . . and that at the morning he received him at the said doors . . . and waited upon him to his own privy chamber.”

And at the end of November Arthur wrote to his in-laws, informing them that “he had never felt such joy in his life as when he beheld the sweet face of his bride. No woman in the world could be more agreeable to him. [He] promises to be a good husband.”

Yet the royal wedding still didn’t mean that all was settled between Spain and England. Initially, Henry had not been keen to have the young couple set up their household and assume full marital relations. Doña Elvira, Katherine’s duenna, agreed with him. But for Katherine, who had inherited her mother’s iron will, time was of the essence and it was she who had managed to change the king’s mind. Additionally, Katherine’s tutor and confessor Alessandro Geraldini persuaded Henry that “on no condition in the world should [he] separate them, but send her with her husband.” Otherwise, Isabella and Ferdinand would be highly displeased and Katherine herself “would be in despair.” So Arthur and Katherine set off for Ludlow, arriving on December 21, 1501.

In the spring of 1502 Arthur became ill, his ailment described by a herald as “the most pitiful disease and sickness that with so sore and great violence had battled and driven, in the singular parts of him inward, [so] that cruel and fervent enemy of nature, the deadly corruption, did utterly vanquish and overcome the pure and friendful blood.” Many modern historians believe that the herald refers to the Sweating Sickness that was sweeping the West Country, or else to a bronchial or pulmonary infection, such as pneumonia or consumption. However, the phrase “the singular parts of him inward” may allude to testicular cancer.

An unknown witness recalled hearing one of Arthur’s servants dating the onset of his illness to Shrovetide, February 8, 1502: “He had lain with the Lady Katherine, and was never so lusty in body and courage until his death, which [he] said was because he lay with the Lady Katherine.” Arthur died on Easter Sunday, April 2, 1502.

The servants’ accounts suggest that the Waleses enjoyed frequent conjugal visits. Katherine’s confessor and tutor, Alessandro Geraldini—who was recalled to Spain not too long after Arthur’s death—concurred. But according to Katherine, between their arrival in Ludlow and Arthur’s death, the newlyweds had spent only seven nights together. Nearly thirty years later, during the hearings regarding the validity of her marriage to Henry VIII the same contradiction would emerge. Arthur’s steward repeated his young master’s boast on the morning after his wedding, to the effect that he “had spent the night in Spain,” although Katherine would testify that she had remained “as intact and uncorrupt as when she emerged from her mother’s womb.”
Arthur’s body lay in state for three weeks before it was buried at Worcester Cathedral. Katherine, sixteen years old, nearly alone and friendless in a foreign kingdom, would remain in England for the next seven years in a state of political limbo. She was retired to Durham House to await whatever fate Henry VII and her parents decided for her. Her debts mounted and when she had to pawn her jewels and plate—a contested element of her dowry—to pay her retinue, she was accused of spending Henry VII’s property.

Henry VII (1457-1509)

Eventually, a marriage was brokered between Katherine and Henry’s surviving son, the future Henry VIII, but her marriage to Arthur and the issue of its consummation would remain the elephant in the parlor—rearing its trunk and smashing breakables—for years. It was the subject of the papal dispensations required for her union with young Henry—a brief and a bull that either contradict or complement each other, depending on one’s interpretation of the wording. The argument over whether Katherine’s union with Arthur was a “true” marriage would be fought again when Henry chose to put her aside in order to wed Anne Boleyn. Katherine continued to insist that she had come to Henry’s bed a twenty-three-year-old virgin. But by the time Henry’s Great Matter was under debate in the late 1520s, Katherine’s keen understanding of dynasty and diplomacy had made her more than a loving wife and devoted mother. She was Spain to Henry’s England, an alliance that possibly overrode any qualms of conscience.

Perhaps Arthur had spent his wedding “night in the midst of Spain” after all.

Do you think the marriage between Katherine and Arthur was consummated? Why or why not?

Got Snow?

It is snowing in Southern Maryland. Woooee. After waiting all winter and beginning to think about spring, a storm roared up the coast and we are in for eight to ten inches. To the right is the 8 AM view off our front porch.

It’s not a friendly storm. The wind is fiendish. All night, snow clots fell on the roof, blown down from the trees. It sounded like a violent snowball fight, but we prefer it to trees laden with ice and snow. Everyone here still talks about the ice storm in the 90’s when they were without power for ten days.

Listening to the thumps last night, I thought about the role weather and climate plays in my books. In the early regencies (written for Kensington) I virtually ignore the fact that it rains so much in England. In thinking back over the five novels I wrote under the Zebra imprint, the weather was not a factor in any of the stories. As a matter of fact in my last book for Kensington, THE CAPTAIN’S MERMAID, my Jamaican born and raised heroine loved to swim in the lake that separated her brother’s estate from the hero’s.

That was my ‘aha’ moment. Even putting my heroine’s home in the warmest spot in England, it is likely that only the most eccentric woman would swim regularly even in the summer. As the title shows, her love of swimming was an essential part of the story so it stayed and not one reader or reviewer complained.

Now, before I dive too deep into writing a book, I research significant weather events. I've learned about the Frost Fair of 1814 and the Year Without a Summer, 1816. That’s Mt. Pinatubo below. Following a massive eruption the ash from Pinatubo spread worldwide and is thought to have caused the colder than usual summer in 1816. That’s a subject I covered in another blog post.

I thought about books and movies set in England during the Regency and considered whether climate or weather played a significant part in the story. More movies came to mind than books, probably because of the visual element in movies.

In the London scenes of the movie AMAZING GRACE it rains. It more than rains. Rain floods out of the sky. London is wet and miserable all the time. The rain dose not so much advance the plot as it creates a mood. IN MASTER AND COMMANDER sun, rain and wind are such a fundamental part of life at sea that weather is like a character.

In the Greer Garson/Laurence Olivier PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, I do not recall rain in any scene except the one where Jane is going to Mr. Bingley’s. In the Keira Knightley P&P rain is used as a cliched plot device.

Tell me, how’s your weather been this winter? How aware are you of the importance of weather or climate in your books? Are they a significant background element or used to further the story? I will check back frequently today but a neighbor just called to say they lost power so if you don’t hear from me, you know why.

Historical romance, birth control and birth rates

I’ve been reading Doris Kearns Goodwin’s award winning tome “Team of Rivals” (a 754-pager that is surely Kindle worthy) about Abraham Lincoln’s political genius. What strikes me are the side stories about the women, and how so many of them had sooooo many children. Mortality for the mother and children was very high. But no one was immune, rich or poor, to endless childbearing and the risks involved.

In the 19th century, almost all women got married. The idea of consciously trying to limit having children would have been revolutionary (except for those “ladies of the trade”).
According to census estimates, an American woman had on average SEVEN to EIGHT children in 1800 (a wife of one of Lincoln’s political friends had SIXTEEN starting at age 22!). By 1900 the number dropped from seven to eight to about 3.5. That number has fallen to about two today. In fact, birth rates have been in decline for some time--they first started falling in the mid 1800s in New England and then among pioneers as they headed west. Why? Before then, it has been speculated, children were educated at home or in church. Once public schooling became available, children became more expensive to care for and less helpful around the house. Women were also freed up from all-day children-rearing, allowing mothers to enter the paid labor force.

However, money doesn’t historically appear to be the only incentive for smaller families.
"We know for sure that you don't have to reach a high level of per capita income for fertility to decline, but we don't know exactly what sets it off," said historian George Atler at Indiana University. "Whether it's general change or attitudes about birth control is still a question debated among demographers today.

Attitudes have definately changed. The dogma of most major religions during the 1800s fdiscouraged birth control, and birth control and divorce were forbidden in the United States. In 1873 the Comstock Act made it illegal to send any so-called obscene materials in the mail, including information about contraception (a topic I have blogged on before). However record sales of family planning books published in the 1830s suggest that the public (women?) were ready to keep families small, regardless of religious or political pressure.

"Moral Physiology" by Robert Dale Owen and Charles Knowlton's "The Fruits of Philosophy" became popular for advocating contraception methods. Owen described coitus interruptus. Knowlton's book included instructions for women on how to wash with a spermicidal solution.

Hacker's historical research may better inform us about the current worldwide trends toward smaller families. "All nations are experiencing fertility declines," said Hacker. "It's becoming a social policy issue as countries face prospects of caring for an aging population."

Much of this info came from:
http://www.livescience.com/history/070215_fewer_children.html.

I must admit, I’ve been reading a lot about the social history of women and now when I read a traditional romance, I worry when the heroine sleeps with the hero without thinking of the consequences--the fall from grace, the expense of children, the risk of death. As a reader, I want her to have that conversation with the hero---even if the book is a historical, no, ESPECIALLY if the book is historical. Maybe she could actually make a conscience effort to avoid getting pregnant. But birth control is still almost never discussed in romance. Any thoughts on why this is? The ick-factor takes the romance out of the sex scene?

Has anybody ready any romances lately where birth control is discussed and done well (a few coitus interruptus scenes come to mind from some recent historicals I’ve read, but not many)?

Near misses in history

We spend a lot of time here debunking accepted historical myths and delving into what really happened. Maybe it's because we approach history as writers and want to improvise upon a set theme or just have an urge to dig deeper. And deeper.

I found out something really fascinating just the other day. I turned to my trusty resource at Historic-UK.com and found that today, February 26, was the date of the first issue of a British one pound note in 1797, a result of the panic caused by the French invasion of Fishguard a few days earlier. The what?! (The invasion, not the pound note. And I don't even want to get into why a pound note could do what a coin couldn't; it makes my head spin the same way a $1.75 trillion deficit does.)

Now popular British myth has it that the last time the country was invaded was in 1066. There were some home grown invasions--didn't the Scots cross the border a few times? How about the Duke of Monmouth in 1685?

Well, Fishguard is in Wales, not England proper; and given that the story has the trappings of a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta and has a woman of a certain age in a starring role, it's no wonder it's not the stuff of legend.

The previous year, the French, under the command of General Lazare Hoche, attempted an invasion of Ireland that, with the support of the Irish, was supposed to spread to the north of England, gaining support in the great industrial cities of the north and marching southwest to Bristol--in other words, taking the major ports. It was foiled by bad weather and poor organization.

In 1797, Bristol was targeted under the command of an Irish-American from South Carolina, William Tate, with four ships carrying over 1,200 soldiers wearing English uniforms, captured earlier--the cloth would only take a dark brown dye so they were known as "La Legion Noir." The weather was too bad to attack Bristol, so they sailed north, landed near Fishguard and unloaded soldiers and weapons. A farm was captured. Vive la France!

The Pembrokeshire Militia gathered, joined by reinforcements from the navy, but discovered the French had superior tactical positions and possibly outnumbered the English. But Tate's forces lost control of the situation, and here's where the G&S elements come in. It's thought that the French, seeing at a distance Welsh women in their traditional dress of red shawls and black hats, were English infantry; furthermore, Tate was having problems with his undisciplined troops becoming mutinous, and the local inhabitants, instead of flocking to support liberte, egalite and fraternite, were hostile.

Hundreds of civilians joined the English troops. As a further blow to French male pride, a local cobbler, 48-year-old Jemima Nicholas, supposedly captured twelve French soldiers singlehanded.

The French surrendered. There's a full account of the invasion at fishguardonline.com.

In a comic postscript, the captured French later escaped in the yacht of the English commander Lord Cawdor.

Over at the Riskies today, talking about the escape of the Corsican Monster from Elba... another legend in his own time.

Why do you think certain events live on in popular memory and others are forgotten?

The Privileged Class Enjoying Its Privileges

I claim to believe in liberty, equality, and fraternity. And I live here.

My heroine Mélanie says these words to her mentor and former lover Raoul in Secrets of a Lady, surrounded by the surrounded by the Siena marble, intricate fretwork, and Aubusson carpet of her elegant Berkeley Square library. Pam had a wonderful post a couple of weeks ago which got me thinking about Mélanie’s words. Pam wrote about the conundrum of being “deeply egalitarian in my attitudes toward social, political, and economic matters” and yet writing “in a genre that centers itself upon the pleasures and pursuits of the Regency ton.”

These days, it's difficult not to think about economic matters. And for those of us who write predominantly about aristocrats, the contrast is perhaps sharper than ever. The 1930s romantic comedies I loved as a child were a big influence on me as a writer. So many of those stories (Holiday, The Philadelphia Story, My Man Godfrey among others) take place in a rarefied world of cocktail parties and dinner dances, weekends in the country and engraved cards of invitation). In many ways it's a fairytale world of escapism with black tie and glamorous gowns and cocktails on the terrace. And yet the darker side of the Depression era is not out of sight. My Man Godfrey begins with the madcap society girl heroine on a scavenger hunt from which she brings back the "forgotten man" hero and makes him the family butler. The hero, Godfrey, turns out to have a more complicated past than meets the eye, one which brings the story back to the whole ever-present question of "forgotten men."

In Holiday, the hero, a young, self-made man, wants to take a holiday and "come back and work when he knows what he's working for" to the horror of his socialite fiancée and her Wall Street father (but the delight of his fiancée's sister). In The Philadelphia Story (which remains one of my all time favorite movies and plays), a left-wing reporter assigned (to his disgust) to cover a society wedding, goes to write about "the privileged class enjoying its privileges" (writing this post, it occurred to me that Bow Street Runner Jeremy Roth in my books probably owes something to Mike Connor; both view the privileged class with a jaundiced eye). In the course of a midsummer night both Mike and the heiress bride-to-be Tracy Lord re-evaluate their attitudes toward social class as well as the nature of love and morality.

My mom, who grew up during the Depression, introduced me to these movies (in the days before vcrs and dvds, we often went to old movie revival houses). My mom was also a lifelong liberal with a strong sense of social justice. As I wrote in response to Pam’s post, “I absorbed strongly egalitarian values from my mom, who also introduced me to Georgette Heyer [and Dorothy Sayers, Margery Allingham, Ngaio Marsh and other writers who's books are largely set in a rarefied and aristocratic world] and took me out for tea and with whom I started writing Regency romances. Even our first book, The Widow’s Gambit, which was very 'London Season,' had scenes set in the darker side of the Regency world. Exploring that darker side is something I’ve done more and more through the years. But there’s no denying my central characters live a very elite privileged existence.” And in my own life, though I certainly don’t live in Charles and Mélanie’s elite world, I confess I’m a political, social, and economic liberal who also enjoys the opera and nice restaurants and has a weakness for designer labels (usually purchased at 70% off :-).

In my books, Mélanie in a sense confronts the same paradox. She married her aristocratic husband Charles Fraser (diplomat, politician, duke's grandson) because she was working for a cause that opposed everything his world stands for. She realizes her marriage had catapulted her neatly over an artificial and quite unconscionable social divide. And yet she thinks in Secrets of a Lady that the longer one played a role, the more natural it became. She had grown all too comfortable with the privileges she had married into. It’s a conundrum she continues to wrestle with. In fact, I think she’ll confront it more in future books, when her past and ideals aren’t so buried.

Mélanie's conflict mirrors a number of my own conflicting feelings as an author who writes about a very privileged set of people. I love reading (and writing) about balls and gowns and country house parties and social intrigue. But I’m also fascinated by the contrast between the “Silver Fork” world and it’s darker, more Dickensian side. When I blogged about this topic on my own website, Stephanie commented, "It’s not an easy line to tread. Because I enjoy reading about 'the glitter and the gold' in historical romance, yet few things raise my hackles more quickly than a hero or heroine born at the top of the food chain and carrying around a whopping sense of entitlement....Maybe the difference between an obnoxious versus a sympathetic member of the elite has to do with how they 'wear' power. Do they wear it expecting lesser beings to tug their forelocks and kowtow? Or do they wear it more lightly, understanding that, as people born to wealth and station, they might have something of a duty to those less fortunate than themselves? I suspect that Regency–and for that matter, Victorian–society had plenty of people occupying both ends of the spectrum."

That range of attitudesgives writers a lot of leeway in how portray characters. Think of the difference between Anne Elliot’s self-absorbed father and elder sister in Persuasion versus Darcy who has a strong sense of the duty that comes with his position. Or the way Emma's attitudes change over the course of her namesake book. When my mom first introduced me to Emma, she compared Emma Woodhouse to Tracy Lord. Austen may not write about climbing boys and the stews of St Giles, but she does a brilliant job of showing the plight of women without a fortune without anyone lecturing about it.

And writing about the powerful, doesn't necessarily mean ignoring social realities. As Taryn commented on my blog, "power, well-used, is very attractive, and mis-used is intriguing as a force to be feared."

As writer Mike Connor says to Tracy Lord, "With the rich and mighty, always a little patience."

How do you feel about power and privilege in the novels you read? Do you prefer to read about characters living an elite and aristocratic life? Do you like to see the dark side of that life or escape in to the fairy tale? Does it make a difference whether the story is set in the past or the present day? Does the current economic situation make you yearn for escapism or make you want stories more grounded in economic reality? Or both?

Just what is sexy?

Pam’s last post got me thinking about what I find sexy (or exciting, or intriguing, or moving) as a writer, as a reader, as a woman. And further, about how I use my own predilections in my books without the book becoming a display of TMI (as has been the accusation for a certain paranormal writer), or worse IMO, ending up with a book with limited appeal (the equivalent of the magazine Bears in the gay community, which has a limited and very specific target audience).

On occasion I stumble across a book which, for whatever reason, turns me off, though I can tell that the author is describing something that she finds attractive. And it always leaves me shaking my head in wonder. Some details are entirely unnecessary, and by using them, you can lose readers, so why do it?

Years ago I heard an author give a workshop about designing/describing heroes and her advice is something that really rang true for me: Give just enough details that the reader can fill in the blanks to make the hero her own. The specific example she used, copious amounts of chest hair, rang especially true for me (TMI WARNING: I would never, under any circumstances, be a subscriber of the afore mentioned Bears magazine). She pointed out that by spending precious time lovingly describing the hero’s hirsute chest, you risk readers who find said expanse of chest pelt repulsive laying aside your book and never picking it back up (and worse, never buying another book by you, for fear for further paeans to something that she finds decidedly unsexy). I know that there are authors I avoid because of these sorts of issues, and I’m sure you all have them too.

To further complicate the issue, those of us who write historicals are also often working against what was considered attractive at the time (mustaches anyone?), or what was simply the predominant look (Prince Valiant bowl cut, mmmm, sexy), or aspects of fashion that simply don’t work for the women of today (wigs = toupee, don’t they, just admit it). Throw in a general lack of sanitation, fashion that may or may not float your readers boat (all that velvet and lace in the 18^th century doesn’t work for a lot of people, though it clearly does for me, LOL). Some of this you can work around by simply glossing over it. Some of it gets done away with by having characters with unusual habits (there’s a lot of bathing in Medieval Romancelandia). And some stuff just gets made up entirely to better conform to modern tastes (here I’m thinking of a recent discussion on one of my loops of sexy silk nightgowns and sheets in Regency romances).

It’s such a balancing act. Is it any wonder that the occasional reader finds herself falling from the highwire of our creation? As a reader, does it bother you when the hero is “over described” or are you able to skim past it and keep your mental image of the hero as you’ve created him? As a writer, do you worry as much as I do about this stuff, or am I truly alone in the crazy, deep end of the pond?

"When I am dancing, I know who I really am."

Book review: Once a Dancer, An Autobiography, by Allegra Kent.

I’ve loved ballet since I was 8 years old and saw Alicia Markova and Jacques D’Amboise dance “Coppelia” at Stern Grove in San Francisco. That was in 1945. From then on I kept scrapbooks of magazine articles about ballet dancers, read everything I could find about dancing, and the summer I was 9, I even talked my grandmother into enrolling me in a beginning ballet class at the Ft. Bragg grange hall in northern California. During my first lesson, Grandma noticed that both my knee joints were swollen and swept me off to the doctor, who said I had rheumatic fever. End of my ballet dreams, but not of my interest.

Reading Allegra Kent’s autobiography (St. Martin’s Press, 1997) was a thrill. Born Iris Cohen, she started lessons relatively late (at age 9) but excelled in both athletic ability and imaginative gifts. Later she joined the New York City Ballet at 16, the youngest member of the company. George Balanchine choreographed some of his best-known dances especially for her.

Allegra was a choreographer’s dream. She was small (she weighed 100 pounds, and if she gained even 5 pound she worked it off at the barre). She was athletic, with a strict regimen of daily attendance at class (even after childbirth), muscle massages, and swimming exercises with water wings attached to her ankles (her own invention). Balanchine described her as “bendable.” She could do a perfect split standing up–one leg straight up over her head.

Kent had a distinctly unique gift as a dancer--an imagination that could transport her physical body into a character with sensitivity and exquisite nuance. And often an unexpected dash of humor, which enchanted Balanchine.

Outside of dancing, though, her life was a mess. Abandoned by her father, dominated by her mother, involved with first no men at all and then a real rake hooked on drugs, she was gun-shy for years. She reveled in motherhood, bore three children, all gifted in the arts, but all her life she scratched for money to raise them on her own. Her late-in-life love died young (at 60), after only four years together.

Like many talented artists, Allegra was her own worst enemy. She trusted the wrong people, struggled with stage fright all her performing life, and, inevitably, she grew older. Over the years he kept her body in shape for dance, had very few injuries and consistently substituted for other dancers who did, and sometimes ended up dancing eight ballets in a single weekend.

Allegra Kent was the oldest member of the ballet company, still performing at 50, when her mentor Balanchine died. New young talents (Suzanne Farrell, Gelsey Kirkland) were joining the company and Allegra was finally eased out of the troupe.

She was devasted. She had held onto dancing because “When I am dancing, I know who I really am.” In the following years she taught at ballet academies, coached other dancers in various ballet troupes, and performed in special “gala”concerts to which she was invited for a starring role.

What is most impressive to me is that she never gave up. She worked at dance; she sacrificed for her children; she loved unwisely and she suffered great losses. But each time she picked herself up, packed up her leotard and pointe shoes, and marched off to her daily regimen of classes.

Sound familiar?