Martha Graham - Dancing Quotes

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To learn to dance by practicing dancing or to live by practicing living, the principles are the same.… One becomes, in some area, an athlete of God.

Martha Graham
Dancing is very like poetry. It's like poetic lyricism, sometimes, it's like the rawness of dramatic poetry, it's like the terror — or it can be like a terrible revelation of meaning. Because when you light on a word it strikes you to your heart.

Martha Graham
I believe that we learn by practice. Whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living, the principles are the same. in each it is the performance of a dedicated set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which comes the shape of achievement, a sense of one's being, a satisfaction of spirit. One becomes in some areas an athlete of God.

Martha Graham
Dancing appears glamorous, easy, delightful. But the path to paradise of the achievement is not easier than any other. There is fatigue so great that the body cries, even in its sleep. There are times of complete frustration, there are daily small deaths. Then I need all the comfort that practice has stored in my memory, a tenacity of faith.

Martha Graham
At the time I started in ballet they were dancing 'The Spirit of Champagne' en pointe, in Paris. I thought, 'I don't want to dance the spirit of champagne, I want to drink it!

Martha Graham
Dancing is just discovery, discovery, discovery — what it all means…

Martha Graham