Dancing and mixed media : early twentieth-century modern dance theory in text and photography /

With this new book Alter has made a significant departure from her well-respected Surviving Exercise (1983) and has provided a richly informative view, in photographs and text, of important dance innovators in the early 20th century. Dancer-writers Mary Beegle, Helen Moller, Margaret H'Doubler, Eleanor Elder, and Margaret Morris have been largely overshadowed by Isadora Duncan. Duncan is given appropriate mention, as is her brother, Raymond; indeed, the book concludes with a Glenna Josephson translation of Raymond Duncan's "Dance and Gymnastics"--it is fascinating to see how closely his ideas and writing style approximate those of his more illustrious sister. The great strength of this current book lies in the panorama of early 20th century dance provided by more than 80 plates. Despite captions that seem to question readers' ability for independent discernment (e.g., "Note similarities to preceding photographs ...") and unclear reproduction of some photographs--perhaps due to the soft focus of the original--the plates provide a rich visual history of the dance and photography of the time. The book is expensive in view of the quality of its binding, tightly concise format, and the fact that the translucent (though archivally approved) paper results in bleed-through from one page to another. As a reference resource, however, this work is invaluable. Upper-division undergraduate; graduate; faculty; professionals. C. W. Sherman; College of William and Mary