A Republic of Dancers: the Contredanse and the Choreography of Identity in Enlightenment-Era France
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A REPUBLIC OF DANCERS: THE CONTREDANSE AND THE CHOREOGRAPHY OF IDENTITY IN ENLIGHTENMENT-ERA FRANCE Amanda Danielle Moehlenpah A dissertation submitted to the faculty at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Romance Studies in the College of Arts and Sciences. Chapel Hill 2021 Approved by: Ellen R. Welch Edward M.J. Nye Jessica Tanner Jacqueline Waeber Lloyd S. Kramer © 2021 Amanda Danielle Moehlenpah ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT Amanda Danielle Moehlenpah: A Republic of Dancers: The Contredanse and the Choreography of Identity in Enlightenment-Era France (Under the direction of Ellen R. Welch and Edward M.J. Nye) In my dissertation, I argue that dance—whether as practice or performance— embodies the ideologies and values of the human communities that creates it. Specifically, I posit that the contredanse, a French derivative of the English country dance, embodied a mode of sociability, which echoed the social ideals and interactive networks of the French Enlightenment. In contrast to the precise choreography and performative elitism of court dancing and ballet, the contredanse incorporated many dancers into a lively, ever-changing series of movements that disregarded class or rank. It favored an egalitarian and interactive approach to human sociability rather than a deterministic and hierarchical social order. I explore the historical and ideological communities fashioned by the contredanse from three perspectives. In the first chapter, I consider the process by which the English country dance became the French contredanse, a process evolving over the course of four translative movements: linguistic, spatial, choreographic, and cultural. In the second chapter, I demonstrate the type of sociability enacted and visualized by the contredanse through its choreographic structures as well as in the socio-economic processes of dance apprenticeship and performance current in eighteenth-century France. In the final chapter, I explore the identificatory interaction of spectators and dancers via the visual display of the contredanse in ballets, comic operas, and other forms of musical theater. The appearance of the contredanse, a “real” social practice, iii within a dramatic performance developed a community of affect that allowed French theater- goers to identify with the world onstage and to authentically experience the emotions and ideas being performed by the fictional characters. What emerges through this tri-part analysis of the exchanges and collective associations encouraged by the contredanse in eighteenth-century France is a highly visible “Republic of Dancers” that embodied the collective identity and sociable ideals of its literary and philosophical counterpart, the Enlightenment Republic of Letters. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The past six years have been fraught with health difficulties, and this dissertation has only been possible because of the tremendous practical, emotional, and spiritual support that I have received from so many across the globe. I would be amiss if I did not, first and foremost, testify to my faith in Jesus Christ as my Sustainer, Strength, and Savior. I would also like to express my deep gratitude to my family and friends in St. Louis, Chapel Hill, Paris, and Oxford who have journeyed alongside me. Additionally, I would like to thank Dr. Ellen R. Welch and Professor Edward M.J. Nye for teaching me to be a writer and scholar and Miss Alexandra “A” Zaharias for instilling in me the passion for dance that Mr. Balanchine gave to you. Dominus illuminatio mea v TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES …………………………………………………………………………… viii INTRODUCTION: ENLIGHTENING HISTORICAL DANCE ………………………………. 1 The Case Study of the Encyclopédies …………………………………………………. 6 Reviving the Undisciplinarity of the Contredanse ……………………………………. 11 CHAPTER 1: TRANSLATING THE COUNTRY DANCE …………………………………. 18 Introduction ……………………………………………………………………………. 18 English Beginnings …………………………………………………………………….. 30 The Choreographic Structure of Country Dancing …………………………………….. 38 The Contredanse: Phase I ………………………………………………………………. 44 The Contredanse: Phase II …………………………………………………………….. 59 La dispute de la contredanse: A Question of Reception………………………………... 68 The Contredanse: Phase III …………………………………………………………….. 76 The Contredanse: Phase IV …………………………………………………………….. 85 CHAPTER 2: THE SOCIABLE CONTREDANSE ………………………………………….. 99 Introduction …………………………………………………………………………….. 99 Towards a Definition of Sociability …………………………………………………... 109 The Sociability of Movement ………………………………………………………… 115 Interpreting the Sociability of Social Dance ………………………………………….. 138 The Republic of Dancers ……………………………………………………………... 144 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………. 162 vi CHAPTER 3: DANCING WITH FEELING TOGETHER ………………………………….. 165 Prologue ………………………………………………………………………………. 165 Act I, Scene 1 …………………………………………………………………………. 171 Act I, Scene 2 …………………………………………………………………………. 174 Act I, Scene 3 …………………………………………………………………………. 177 Act I, Scene 4 …………………………………………………………………………. 182 Act II, Scene 1 ………………………………………………………………………… 190 Act II, Scene 2 ………………………………………………………………………… 193 Intermède …………………………………………………………………………….. 198 Act III, Scene 1 ……………………………………………………………………….. 202 Act III, Scene 2 ……………………………………………………………………….. 208 Act III, Scene 3 ……………………………………………………………………….. 222 Epilogue ………………………………………………………………………………. 235 DANCING IN BORDERLANDS: A CONCLUSION ………………………………………. 237 APPENDIX 1: CONTREDANSES, BY NAME (C. 18TH CENTURY) …………………….. 246 APPENDIX 2: CONTREDANSE RECUEILS AND FEUILLES (C. 18TH CENTURY) …….. 268 APPENDIX 3: THE CONTREDANSE IN DRAMATIC SPECTACLES ………………….. 291 FIGURES ……………………………………………………………………………………... 295 BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………………………………….. 311 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure A.1 – Bal du roi ……………………………………………………………………….. 295 Figure A.2 – Analysis of Beauty, Plate II …………………………………………………….. 296 Figure 1.1. – “A Table Explaining the Characters […]” …………………………………….. 297 Figure 1.2 – “Goddesses” and “Faine I would” ………………………………………………. 298 Figure 1.3 – “De la présence du Corps” ……………………………………………………… 299 Figure 1.4 – “Des pas” ……………………………………………………………………….. 300 Figure 1.5 – Landrin’s Pot-pourri: Title Pages …………………………………………………….. 301 Figure 1.6 – De La Cuisse’s Le Répertoire des bals: Title Page …………………………………. 302 Figure 1.7 – “Les 4 Sœurs” …………………………………………………………………… 303 Figure 1.8 – “L’Espagnolette” ……………………………………………………………….. 304 Figure 2.1 – “Christchurch Bells” …………………………………………………………….. 305 Figure 2.2 – “La Révérence” …………………………………………………………………. 306 Figure 2.3 – Grown Gentlemen Taught to Dance …………………………………………….. 307 Figure 2.4 – Le Maître de danse ……………………………………………………………… 308 Figure 2.5 – Bal paré ………………………………………………………………………….. 309 Figure 2.6 – Bal public ……………………………………………………………………….. 310 viii INTRODUCTION: ENLIGHTENING HISTORICAL DANCE “Miss Amanda, are you dancing ‘Mr. Beveridge’s Maggot’?” A tall, lanky young man in nicely-pressed trousers and a brick-red sweater extends his open palm to the girl standing along the side of the ballroom. He has singled her out among the throngs of colorful skirts and, once assured of her willingness, leads her from the margins of the dancing space to front and center where everyone—the hundreds of dancers staking places on every available square inch of parquet floor—will be able to see her. He knows she is a capable dancer: with light feet that glide from position to position, a dainty hand that brushes his then pulls away when musically commanded, and a quick mind that recalls the sequence and range of movements necessary to execute “Mr. Beveridge’s Maggot.” She dare not refuse. To do so would be extremely rude, but neither is it something she desires. His hopeful daring rewarded, the lad grasps the girl’s bestowed hand with a smile of pleasure and situates her within the dancing space such that she will command the focus of the room and magically synchronize the dancers in one, fluid gesture, ebbing and flowing as if in dialogue with the fiddle accompanying them. Perhaps this scene seems overly-dramatized to the modern reader, too imitative of period television dramas produced for the romantically-inclined viewer. Indeed, “Mr. Beveridge’s Maggot”—an English country-style dance first described in the ninth printing of John Playford’s The Dancing Master (1695)—is featured in the 1995 BBC miniseries production of Pride and 1 and Prejudice. 1 It is this choreography in two parallel lines, gentlemen to the left and ladies to the right, that foregrounds the first, searing dialogue between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet.2 Nevertheless, the camera’s isolation of the dancing couple belies the collective nature of the dance and the interactions that it fosters not only between partners but between all the couples on the dance floor. The kinetic script of the country dance—a series of walking steps through crossing and circling geometric configurations, in time to a few bars of uncomplicated violin music—links the individual bodies of “as many as will,” bringing them together in a harmonious community of movement. The choreography initiates a conversation among the dancers; between the dancers, their spectators, and the musicians; between the time of the music and the space of the body(ies); and across centuries and cultures, among French, English, or American dancers of the seventeenth, eighteenth—yes, even the twenty first century, as the lad and his lady will attest.3 In re-presenting the movements and structures of the dance form, the dancers