Mariinsky “Giselle”: Olga Spessivtseva

Even from the lineup of great Giselles, one solitary figure clearly stands out. Olga Spessivtseva’s early life ( she was born on July 18, 1895 ) falls between two Russian revolutions. Abrupt cataclysmic changes and collapse of the old world displaced millions of people and destroyed millions of lives. Olga was not a Scarlet O’Hara to walk against the wind, rather her tragic life is a reflection on turbulent times. Almost all of her roles carried within a premonition of the future, the inevitability of death and destruction of beauty. Theme of Beauty ruthlessly trampled upon and reacquired only in the afterlife, sounded particularly pure and clear in her rendering of Giselle.

“Having slowly risen from the grave, she timidly approached the mistress of the willis. then begins to rotate on one leg, extending the other in a flowing arabesque. It was like a dream, so powerful in its expression that it seemed to lie outside the realm of possible”, – wrote Spessivtseva’s contemporary Bogdanov-Berezovsky

“She performed the end of the first act sans pantomime, but with dancing steps alone, and in the theater everyone was weeping. After the first act the audience jumped to its feet and staged for Olga an unprecedented ovation. Yet the next morning she came to me sad and defeated: “I shouldn’t dance Giselle anymore, I come to resemble her too much”, – from the letter of contemporary to Olga’s sister Zinaida

And so she did. Olga loses her sanity and spends years in sanatorium, not recognizing anyone. At the twilight of her life she miraculously recovers and even recalls the steps from the ballet. Rare black and white photos and videos of the period keep memory alive of this extraordinary beautiful ballerina and perhaps the greatest Giselle ever.