outside reading vii

Outside Reading VII-
an editorial
by Sarah Maslin Nir
To Some Dancers, 'Black Swan' is a Cautionary Tale
January 9, 2011. 

To Some Dancers, 'Black Swan' is a Cautionary Tale is not so much a review of the movie itself, but rather a review of the effects that dancing may have on young people, and how the movie reflects it. The author seems to believe that ballet can be harmful to young girls- from the pressure on the girls to be thin to the submissiveness they feel working under a male instructor.

Nir begins the article by discussing the life of a real-life ballerina, Carmella Imrie. By beginning the article discussing a real person rather than Natalie Portman’s character, she evokes emotion in the readers- the things that happen in this movie could really happen in real life. This makes us feel pity and we are better able to sympathize with some of the consequences that ballet dancers may take. Nir does this many times, bringing in specific examples from real-life ballerinas, for instance saying “At dance camps [Tara Hutton, an aspiring ballerina] attended growing up, drinking quarts of Crystal Light and cup after cup of coffee to tame hunger pangs was a common practice.”

She also uses juxtaposition to illustrate an ugly side of ballet. She places phrases like “pirouettes”, “twirling” and “fashionable shrugs” in close proximity with phrases like “feet are bloodied”, “lights go out on her”, and “angry red lines that she clawed into her skin.” The first few phrases make the reader imagine a graceful, thin, and beautiful swan, which is indeed what these ballerinas aspire to be. But then so suddenly striking these images down with sad imagery and gore is a very effective way to illustrate the darker side of dance. Her strong language in general is just off-putting in regards to ballet; simply reading “Nina’s toenails crack off in her toe shoes” or “her fingers are bandaged to hide the raw patches of skin she casually peels” just makes me cringe.

Though Nir’s persona seems to warn of the effects of dance, she keeps the article informative by offering another point of view. She provides the opinion of Diana Byer, the artistic director of the New York Theater Ballet. Byer argues that the movie is exaggerated and dramatized and very nearly a farce. Because Nir offers this other point of view, I as a reader was able to more accurately form my own opinions, rather than solely being given hers.

I believe that, if this were an AP essay, the tone would be appropriate. It is sufficiently formal, and like I said, Nir’s use of rhetoric and her appeal to ethos are effective ways to get her points across.