Anyone who doubts that the Bolshoi Ballet’s American summer tour had as much to do with politics and hype as it did with Art had only to peruse the opening paragraph of the “Greeting” from Bruce Crawford, general manager of the Metropolitan Opera, that prefaced the lavishly produced souvenir program:
Pride and enormous satisfaction are felt at the Metropolitan Opera as the Bolshoi Ballet, one of the glories of the dance world, returns to the United States after far too long an absence. The company’s visit comes at an historic moment—just as our countries reach new agreements and understanding. Through the arts, the universal language, all people are one people, and through programs of cultural exchange, our knowledge of others, as well as of ourselves, grows richer, more precise, more profound.
What amazes and disturbs in Crawford’s statement is not so much what is said as what is left unsaid. The Bolshoi’s “far too long an absence” from this country is, after all, owing to the fact that on its last visit here, in 1979, it lost three of its principal dancers through defection; and whatever “new agreements and understanding” may at present exist between the Soviet Union and the United States, the reasons why Soviet dancers defect have not changed. This fact of life was graphically illustrated on the cover of the souvenir program and on the posters, both of which conspicuously featured Gediminas Taranda, the Bolshoi’s first-cast Abderakhaman in Raymonda and Yashka in
