Tonya Plank (a.k.a. Swan Lake Samba Girl), Eva Yaa Asantewaa, and Counter Critic all attended the informal talk at Barnard College Monday night between dance writer Mindy Aloff and Times newish dance critic in chief Alastair Macaulay. (I didn’t make it.)
Everyone was relieved to find he was not an ogre.
I coulda told you that!–in person he’s a very sweet man (all my friends who are his friends say so, too). I don’t think that was ever the issue.
And the bloggers do still have reservations. It’s a little depressing, though, to think that if he had been ugly and blustery, say, they might have said it had gone to show …. Writing isn’t talking; who you are in print is rarely an uncomplicated reflection of who you are in person.
Here’s Eva.
Here’s Tonya.
Here’s countercritic.
In case, you’ve only tuned in lately to Foot in Mouth, we’ve been blabbering about Macaulay and what the hire says about the Times for a while. If you’re curious, check out the archives.
From Eva:
Hi, Apollinaire. I’ve just written a comment to counter critic, who misrepresented an aspect of my remarks to Macaulay at the Barnard talk. And as I read what you’ve written here, I hope that readers will take a look at what I actually wrote on my blog. Macaulay’s congenial personality was not all I had in mind. To focus on that–“Gee whiz! these bloggers all went gaga for Macaulay’s niceness!”–undercuts both what I said during the event and what I wrote in my post. Please take a look. It’s a little more complex and subtle than that. ~ Eva
Apollinaire: Hi, Eva. Yes, I was hoping people would check out what you–and Tonya and counter critic–said. And I didn’t mean to misrepresent your argument, I was kind of teasing, plus needed to be brief, and I was struck by a solicitousness in your post–not a terrible thing at all.
Apollinaire Scherr talks about dance
Leave a Reply