Books: A Very Young Dancer

[Missgoodytoeshoes]

A Very Young Dancer was my favorite book as a child. I have always been curious about what happened to Stephanie, the little girl in the book. Does anyone know?

[dance4life56]

The sister thread has a topic similar to this. Here is the link: click here

It did not have much information, but the most significant piece seemed to be:

 

A friend of mine was a classmate of hers at SAB at around that age, I know she did not in fact go on to join the company. This may not be correct, but I believe also her family is the one that donated the famous Neapolitan angel ornaments to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC that are on their big tree every holiday season.

[Liz Power]

Oh, good god, I was obsessed with that whole series...A Very Young Dancer, A Very Young Actress, A Very Young Skater, A Very Young Rider...and, as my parents used to joke about the expense of these careers, A Very Young Tax Lawyer.

[Tuesday]

I also loved that series as a child! I gave my copy of A Very Young Dancer to my son, who has enjoyed it as well. He loved the photos of the kids in class at SAB.

 

It's great to hear other people were wondering what happened to the kids in the book, too. I thought I might be the only one who cared, haha! Does anyone know what happened to Stephanie's cavalier, who I believe was named Stephen Austin? I think I tried to google him a while back but couldn't find anything really definitive.

[Rachie]

I still have the book, it was the kind of book i would read under the covers when i was little, looking over the pictures first, then actually reading it. Somehow it always broke my heart that she might rather "do something with horses" than do ballet. It puzzles me though the way that the book is not written by her, but is still in first person. I guess it took a lot of interviews.

[Christina]

I was wondering too!

Actually recently we checked out A Very Young Skater which I never read before and I was so impressed how Katherine was not only a professional skater but studying ballet at SAB! I recently looked her up bc I was curious what happened and was happily amazed to find out this about her:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katherine_Healy

I also saw videos of her recent iceskating and it is so beautiful to see an iceskater who is a ballerina.

Very talented lady indeed!

[dance1soccer1]

Good heavens, what a talented individual! I forwarded this to my daughter as inspiration.

[koshka]

I was and remain a big fan of this series and have managed to acquire copies of the Dancer, Skater, Circus Flyer, and Gymnast books.

 

There is also a quite funny parody called A Very Young Housewife.

 

I'll see if I can find a link.

[cantdance]

You can see her perform on the Merv Griffin Show at age 10. Search her name on youtube.

[balletluverr92]

i used to get this book out ALL the time at the liberary

[tangerinetwist]

The dancer in cast B as Clara, Susie Eisner (Elay), has had several articles published by Dance Teacher and Dance Spirit magazines.

[Giselle76]

I never heard of these books, they sound great! I'm reading now the article about the young Skater, what inspiration for kids out there!!

[Serendipity]

They are quite difficult to get now. I got a copy of "Dancer" through amazon and it was VERY expensive for the paperback!! And VERY hard to find. I gave it to my niece, who has just started "real" ballet (age 5) and is Nutcracker-obsessed. ;-)

 

There's an actress listed in a cast list in a show in London with the same name. Here's the link:

 

http://www.maltadramacentre.org/RomeoJuliet_2008_1.html

[trythis]

Actually recently we checked out A Very Young Skater which I never read before and I was so impressed how Katherine was not only a professional skater but studying ballet at SAB! I recently looked her up bc I was curious what happened and was happily amazed to find out this about her:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katherine_Healy

I also saw videos of her recent iceskating and it is so beautiful to see an iceskater who is a ballerina.

Very talented lady indeed!

I was a skater so I remember being inspired by this book, and when I was young Katherine was frequently featured on TV. She is also in the movie 9 1/2 weeks with Dudley Moore and Mary Tyler Moore, she plays a young dancer with lukemia.

I believe she has returned to her skating career and now works as a choreographer.

[Marga]

She is presently teaching ballet at American Theater Dance Workshop, school of the Eglevsky Ballet.