WINTER SEASON: A DANCER'S JOURNAL -- Other Reviews

Best Books 2003

"... this observant glimpse into the professional dance world has been reissued, with a new preface by Bentley. A first-hand account of the harsh challenges and fleeting rewards of an exacting art form, the book was deservedly praised by critics and by George Balanchine (lionized choreographer-director of NYCB) for its freshness, candor and eloquence. And it's still an enlightening read."

-- Misha Berson, The Seattle Times

DANCER'S INSIDE STORY CONTINUES TO INTRIGUE

It has been 20 years since Toni Bentley first made waves in the dance world by publishing her enthralling and often pain-filled account of a season with the New York City Ballet. Yet Winter Season -- A Dancer's Journal, out this fall in paperback from the University Press of Florida, remains a unique and captivating journey behind the curtain of a great ballet company -- and into the mind of an ambitious and conflicted young dancer.

Although Winter Season represents a youthful effort -- Bentley has since become known as an author rather than a dancer -- it is a mature piece of writing and an enduring ballet-insider story. Bentley reflects on the near-impossible standards to which a young dancer holds herself and on the craving for approval of which she is keenly self-aware. But what makes Bentley's account transcendent are two elements: Her providential timing offers a snapshot of one of the world's foremost ballet companies during the autumn of its era under genius founder and director George Balanchine. And her own insightful introspection creates drama out of her efforts to fit herself into the overarching purposes of Balanchine.

December 26, 2003 -- Diane Hubbard Burns, Orlando Sentinel Dance Critic

"Winter Season is quite possibly the most revealing book about the world of ballet ever to see print...Miss Bentley brings to this world of sensuality a rare degree of insight and detachment, writing about it with a touch so sure as to suggest the cat-like nuances of Colette...Clear-eyed grace...No matter what shape her future as a dancer may assume, she will have the lasting satisfaction of knowing that in Winter Season she has written a minor classic about the strange profession she loves so passionately."

--Saul Goodwin, The National Review