January 6, 1993
He died in the suburbs of Paris. Rudolf Nureyev. Ballet star. The first Soviet dancer to "defy return."
I dislike rigid boundaries. I don't want anyone to decide my future for me, to determine the direction I should take. I'll try to achieve this on my own. That's what I mean by "freedom."
Born in 1938, on a train Vladivostok — a mother with three daughters was going to see her husband who served there.
Isn't it symbolic that I was born en route, between two stations? Apparently, I was destined to become a cosmopolitan.
Mother is from Kazan, father - from under Ufa, In the documents he was recorded as a "Tatar".
Our Tatar blood runs fast and is always ready to boil.
During the war, my father went to the front, my mother and children went to Bashkiria. They were starving. There were no clothes either: Rudik's mother took him to first grade wearing his sister's coat.
As soon as the children saw me, they started singing in unison, "We have a beggar in our class!" At the time, I didn't understand much Tatar. At home, I asked my mother what the children's words meant. She blushed and told me to ignore them. But eventually, she explained that "pobirushka" meant "beggar."
In 1945, his mother got a ticket to the Bashkir Opera and Ballet Theater. She took the children with her as a chance. Luckily, the crowd tore the doors off their hinges and carried all five of them inside. Rudik fell in love with ballet.
I felt like I had left the real world, like I was captured by a dream… I was possessed
He danced everywhere—on stairwells, in hallways. He joined a folk ensemble and took lessons from an exiled St. Petersburg ballerina. Anna Udaltsova. The father, who dreamed of a son with whom he could hunt and fish, became angry. And he beat him every time he saw him dancing.
It's not even the fact that my father beat me that's scary. He talked all the time. Endlessly. Without stopping. He said he would make a man out of me... He shouted that I was growing up to be a ballerina.
At 17, having earned 3000 rubles in a shoemaker’s cooperative, he went to Leningrad — to the choreographic school. The teacher who administered the exam declared that I would either be a brilliant dancer or a complete failure.
Now I know what she meant: I have to work like crazy. My manner, my dancing style was unstable.
Compared to his classmates, who had been studying since he was 7 or 8, he looked like an "ugly duckling." They teased him for being a "redneck." He was relentless in training and brash in communication. He considered his transition to teaching "a gift from fate." To Alexander Pushkin — He believed in the guy and helped him achieve success.
He received his first standing ovation in 1958 at the Moscow Ballet Competition.
Rudolf Nureyev was like a taut string. I've never seen anything like it.
(Vladimir Vasiliev)
I was invited to join the Bolshoi troupe. But I stayed in Leningrad. I partnered with the prima ballerina. Natalia Dudinskaya. I suffered from not being allowed to fully express myself – I wanted to dance more.
In 1961, the Kirov Theatre came on tour to Paris. The French press was delighted with Nureyev. The artist ignored KGB regulations, partying and socializing with foreigners. From his subsequent tours in London He was removed right before the flight. Right there, at the airport, Nureyev requested political asylum.
I knew this was the only way out, because it was the only way that gave me hope that I… would be able to learn, grow, see the world
In the USSR, Nureyev was accused of treason and sentenced in absentia to seven years in prison; the sentence was only overturned in 1998.
A week after his "leap to freedom," Nureyev was already dancing at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées—a resounding success. French communists tried to boo his first performance, but since they didn't know the order of the dancers, they booed everyone.
Somehow, I wasn't scared at all. A strange sense of peace even came over me: the joy of being able to dance calmly while these fools were making a mockery of themselves.
Later he got a job at the Royal Ballet of Great Britain. He was a permanent partner Margot Fonteyn.
In 1964 he put in Viennese The opera "Swan Lake" received such a standing ovation after the performance that the curtain had to be raised more than 80 times.
In the 1980s he was director of the ballet troupe at the Paris Grand Opera.
At 45, he learned he was HIV-positive. When he could no longer dance, he trained as a conductor and performed with the Vienna Residence Orchestra.
He died at the age of 54.
