Alicia Markova, 94; Ballet Great Influenced Dance for Decades

Dame Alicia Markova, one of the 20th century’s greatest classical dancers and a major influence on generations of ballet stars, has died. She was 94.

Markova died Thursday in Bath, England, representatives of the English National Ballet, announced. No cause of death was given. She had worked for the company earlier in the year, but her health had worsened a few months ago.

Markova’s unprecedented 52-year professional career took her from the groundbreaking experiments of the legendary Diaghilev Ballets Russes through the formation of such ongoing dance institutions as London’s Royal Ballet and the American Ballet Theatre.

“Her role in the development of our [national] ballet cannot be exaggerated,” wrote British critic and dance historian Arnold Haskell in his 1977 book, “Balletomania: Then and Now.” “She made possible the revival of the great classics, she inspired the dancers, and she packed the theater as no other dancer could have done.”

Although she always danced contemporary ballets, she became legendary in works associated with Anna Pavlova -- in particular Mikhail Fokine’s “Les Sylphides” and “The Dying Swan” -- and the 19th century classics, especially “Giselle.”

“No one can dance ‘Giselle’ like Markova, and no one should try to,” wrote British critic Richard Buckle. “Hers is a personal and extraordinary interpretation which defies analysis and which it would be fatal to copy. She breaks every rule and gives one of the greatest performances of our day.”

She was born Lillian Alicia Marks in London on Dec. 1, 1910. Although she was an active child, a doctor suggested dancing classes as a way of strengthening her frail legs. She soon began attracting attention in her dance school’s annual performances and in competitions, earning her first rave review (11 words long) at age 8.

She made her professional debut two years later and was quickly nicknamed “the miniature Pavlova.” Reviewing her work at age 12, a critic for the London Daily Mirror wrote that she “combined the sang-froid of a prima ballerina with the daintiness and freshness of youth.”

The great Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev discovered her when she was 14, Russianized her name and made her a soloist in his Ballets Russes, the most innovative company of its time.

“By taking infinite pains over her stage costumes and adapting existing designs to suit her extreme youth and fragile appearance, Diaghilev taught Alicia to know her weak points,” Anton Dolin, her most famous future partner, wrote in a biography of her.

Camouflaging her limitations paid off: The title role in George Balanchine’s “Le Chant de Rossignol” was created for her in 1925, and she took on many other major roles in the Diaghilev repertory until Diaghilev’s death in 1929.

Markova then returned to London, dancing early works by choreographers Frederick Ashton and Antony Tudor for the pioneering Ballet Rambert. In 1931, she joined the company that would eventually emerge as the Royal Ballet, Covent Garden.

As its founding prima ballerina, she became the first British dancer to perform the title role in “Giselle” and Odette/Odile in the complete “Swan Lake.” When she made her debut in the latter classic, she used large brilliants that Anna Pavlova had worn on stage to adorn her crown as the Swan Queen.

In the late 1930s, she formed a touring company with Dolin -- another former Diaghilev dancer -- and they were widely recognized as the supreme ballet team of the age.

“There have been moments when our dancing has been touched with a magic which comes to few artists who have not had the good fortune to dance together for thousands of nights,” Dolin wrote of their partnership.

Markova next danced for the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, inspiring seminal works by Leonide Massine. In 1941, she rejoined Dolin for a four-year association with the company that would evolve into American Ballet Theatre.

New works by Massine and Tudor highlighted those years, but her core repertory remained the delicate, magical Romantic classics.

“The more you see her, the higher you value her,” commented American critic Edwin Denby on her performances in New York City. “In every department of classical technique, she is flawless.... Markova has power too as an actress. She alters her style to characterize her part, even to giving her virtuosity no special play....

“When you watch her, the whole body shows that unpredictable burning edge of movement that the living images of real life have, which continue so mysteriously to live inside our hearts, and out of whose inexhaustible light art is made.”

Guest performances, a stint on Broadway in the revue “Seven Lively Arts,” a brief but ecstatically received return to Covent Garden and tours with Dolin occupied her until 1949, when a series of galas led to the formation of the company that is now the English National Ballet.

She remained its prima until 1952, then freelanced all over the map, including in Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Israel, Europe and the U.S. But she returned to her London company for her final performances before retiring as a dancer in 1962. The following year she was named Dame of the Order of the British Empire.

She subsequently served as the director of the Metropolitan Opera Ballet in New York and as a professor of ballet and the performing arts at the University of Cincinnati. She later became a coach and teacher for a number of companies, including the Royal Ballet.

She also made many television appearances -- among them master classes on her most celebrated roles -- and she wrote two books: “Giselle and I” and “Markova Remembers.”

She never married.