by Colum Mc Cann (Author)
This novel opens on a battlefield: trudging back from the front through a ravaged and icy wasteland, their horses dying around them, their own hunger rendering them almost savage, the Russian soldiers are exhausted as they reach the city of Ufa, desperate for food and shelter. They find both, and then music and dance. And there, spinning unafraid among them, dancing for the soldiers and anyone else who'll watch him, is one small pale boy, Rudolf. This is Colum McCann's dancer: Rudolf, a prodigy at six years old, who became the greatest dancer of the century, who redefined dance, rewrote his own life, and died of AIDS before anyone knew he had it. This is an extraordinary life transformed into extraordinary fiction by one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation. One kind of masculine grace is perfectly matched to another in Colum McCann's beautiful and daring new novel.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 384
Publisher: Phoenix
Published: 06 Oct 2003
ISBN 10: 075381823X
ISBN 13: 9780753818237
Book Overview: 40,000 marketing campaign No.1 in Evening Standard and 4 in Irish Times bestseller lists Shortlisted for the Kerry Group Irish Fiction Award 'Every year I find two or three books that stand way above the others. This year my special finds will also be bestsellers, Embers by Sandor Marai and Dancer by Colum McCann...Stark, understated, powerful, passionate, clever, truly memorable, I could go on' Sarah Broadhurst's PB Preview for 2003 'My hot tip for the entire year. I believe that Colum McCann's DANCER will become a classic' Sue Morgan, Ottaker's 'McCann's agile, muscular prose creates its own energy and rhythm - he has taken one of the most charismatic characters of the 20th century and created a boldly contemporary novel' Lisa Allardice, Daily Telegraph 'Imagine Anthony Burgess and Richard Holmes collaborating to write a novel, and you have something of the flavour' Martyn Bedford, New Statesman 'Like its subject, it spins with virtuoso, charismatic brilliance around a core of wilful mystery' Judith Mackrell, Guardian' Colum McCann's imagined life of Rudolf Nureyev...sets as high a benchmark for the fiction of 2003 as one could hope for 'Laurence Wareing, The Herald