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" I first read 'An American Tragedy' in college, and in my entire life I had never read anything so painful. "

Robert Gottlieb

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" One of the odder byways of nonfiction is the dishy memoir by those who have served the great or the near-great. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Paris, as always, is swarming with Americans, and these days, it's also swarming with hamburgers. Oddly, though, it's not typically the Americans who are pursuing the perfect burger on the perfect bun with the obligatory side of perfect coleslaw; the Americans are pursuing the perfect blanquette de veau. "

Robert Gottlieb

" 'The Leaves Are Fading' had something of a vogue when Antony Tudor made it in 1975, largely because of Gelsey Kirkland's ravishing performance. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Yes, bad or mediocre ballets can be useful to the dancers and temporarily fun for the audience, but in the long run, the lowering of standards can only erode the art form we all love. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Once, Pina Bausch was about something, however disagreeable. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Dance stories, unlike those in opera, are usually simple. "

Robert Gottlieb

" The best seat in the house often depends on the ballet. For instance, much of the first act of 'The Nutcracker' is domestic and small scale, so it's great to sit up close. But the second act features elaborate scenery and choreography, which are better to observe from a distance. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Audiences love Paul Taylor, and so do I. Not everything, and not always, but year in, year out, he gives me more concentrated pleasure than I get from any other dance company. "

Robert Gottlieb

" You don't have to be a member of the New York Psychoanalytic Institute to figure out that when you title a memoir of your parents 'Them,' you're performing an act of distancing. "

Robert Gottlieb

" With literary fiction, generally a film maker falls in love with a book. In commercial fiction, it's a producer or studio falling in love with a book they can make into a movie with worldwide appeal. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Twyla Tharp set her sights on ballet, and ballet, hungry for major talent, succumbed. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Tolstoy may be right about happy and unhappy families, but in ballet, it works the opposite way: All good ballets are different from each other and all bad ones are alike, at least in one crucial respect - they're all empty. "

Robert Gottlieb

" For Russians, to whom Pushkin's poem 'Eugene Onegin' is sacred text, the ballet's story and personae are as familiar and filled with meaning as, for instance, 'Romeo' and 'Hamlet' are for us. Russians know whole stretches of it by heart, the way we know Shakespeare and Italians know Dante. "

Robert Gottlieb

" How can educated and sophisticated viewers react so differently to a work of art? Is it just Kulture Klash? No, since most of the time there's no Klash at all. On the occasions when we disagree, it may be because we're looking for different things in dance. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Despite the rigid classicism of the famous Paris Opera school and company, the French have done more than their share to unmoor la Danse from its traditions and standards. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Acting has changed since the nineteen-forties. "

Robert Gottlieb

" As an editor, I have to be tactful, of course. "

Robert Gottlieb

" No agent/publisher is in a position to create across a spectrum of media and distribution what major publishers can accomplish for authors. "

Robert Gottlieb

" In 1998, Vanity Fair asked me to write a big piece for them on the 50th anniversary of the New York City Ballet. My life, to a great extent, had been spent at and with the New York City Ballet, and I decided to try it. It was very scary, writing about something I loved so much and had such strong opinions about. "

Robert Gottlieb

" 'Seven Sonatas,' with its flowing series of meetings between men and women in an identifiable emotional world, is in the mould of Jerome Robbins' glorious 'Dances at a Gathering.' "

Robert Gottlieb

" How do you rate works of genius? Partly by personal inclination, partly by accepted wisdom, partly by popularity. "

Robert Gottlieb

" When December comes, can 'The Nutcracker' be far behind? No, it can't - not in America, anyway. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Writing happened to me. I didn't decide to start writing or to be a writer. I never wanted to be a writer. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Ladies: You have to support an infant with a hand under its head. "

Robert Gottlieb

" The first movement ballerina should be a paradigm of strength and authority. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Editing requires you to be always open, always responding. It is very important, for example, not to allow yourself to want the writer to write a certain kind of book. Sometimes that's hard. "

Robert Gottlieb

" Some readers took 'Heaven's My Destination' as a satire on Christianity and the Midwest, but today it reads like a loving comedy. "

Robert Gottlieb

" I can almost always read a new manuscript overnight. "

Robert Gottlieb

" How the English love playing at being naughty boys! "

Robert Gottlieb

" Controversy sells books. "

Robert Gottlieb