Black Swan - a lament
I wonder if Odette dies because she cannot accept her wild, sexual and sensual side personified by Odile. You wish this was the only interpretation… you wish!
I used to watch this ballet over and over again when I was a child. My Russian grandmother owned it on video tape. I loved the scene where the beautiful swan lowered her head and fell asleep. Although I didn’t know those words back then I was struck by her grace and dignity. Until one day my grandmother explained to me that she wasn’t sleeping. She died. And yes, I cried every time the Swan Queen died. I didn’t understand why the Prince, who looked just as pure and white as she did, preferred the black swan over the white one. For years I didn’t even realize that both swans are danced by the same woman. I was just seven years old when I saw it for the first time so what do you expect? When I was about ten I saw it for the first time in a theatre. And again I cried. By the names in the booklet I could finally tell that the same ballerina embodied both swans. It confused me a lot back then. What did I know about the dark, sexual side of women? I was just a child.
And now this: The Black Swan. The story of the ballet tells us that Rotbart disguised his own daughter to resemble the Swan Queen and seduce the prince. But how much more heart-breaking is the story from the movie? The white swan literally haunted by its black counterpart. How the movie builds suspense. What is real, what is imagination? Don’t you just want that poor tortured girl to die? And didn’t we all think: It doesn’t matter what happens to her as long as she finishes her dance? And then, the first climax when the two swans fight each other and you know even then that only one of them will leave the change room. I shed the first tears during the dance of the black swan. There was more than passion, more than lust and sensuality. It was madness. And yet you couldn’t help it. The same body, the same face but her beauty had lost all fragility and for the first time she really was a woman. How wild my own heart beat when she spread her black wings and dragged the whole world into the vortex of her pirouettes. I’m crying even now.
All the women, all the girls out there: Didn’t you feel just the same? Didn’t you shed tears for the black swan in your own soul that you keep hidden all too often? Aren’t you sometimes sick of being the good housewife, good mother, good daughter? Didn’t it even physically hurt to see the absolute beauty of her darkness? But why? Do you know why it hurts? Because deep down inside we know that we cannot be both. The life of a white swan ensures us security and stability. It is in our nature to seek that. And it is also in our nature to seek the thrill, the true passion and sensuality that comes with being a sexual being. But doesn’t your white soul fight a continuous and desperate battle against the temptations and seduction of your own black soul? And wouldn’t you sometimes give your right hand for the privilege to be the black swan, if only for one night? But our world still doesn’t really appreciate strong, independent and sensual women. How are they called? Seducers, whores, … We still accept the male wish for the virgin, the saint. We comply… The whore for a night, the saint for life? Men, is it this what you really want?
In an attempt to kill the black swan the white one kills herself. You can read the movie like this. And then in the end she was the good girl she was always meant to be. But what about this interpretation: The black swan kills the white one and with this also herself. But it doesn’t matter as she felt and lived her darkness for one single dance. This is probably the truth that makes me cry because I refuse to accept it: A decision has to be made in the life of every woman. We cannot be both saint and whore for a long period of time. We might be able to switch in our early age but soon enough we have to comply and be what is expected from us. If we don’t, we might be able to lead an exciting, dangerous and adventurous life… deprived of all stability.
Tempting, isn’t it?
