Mikhail Baryshnikov Quotes
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My father was a Party member and he was a pretty high rank military officer under the colonel, junior colonel, I don't know the term. He was a total Stalinist. A bit with a streak of anti-Semitism and very shrewd man, a very kind of nervous man.
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You see, dancers are quite mature people because they start performing so early. They become professionals when they start to take everyday classes.
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I adored my mother, and I will always have extraordinary memories about her and remember her, and she opened the doors for me to appreciate arts.
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I feel very uneasy with a lot of aspects of the Russian life and the Russian people.
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If your only dance experience is the Nutcracker, it will be a shock; hopefully shocking in a good way.
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My mother had a son from previous marriage and her husband died in Second World War.
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I really reject that kind of comparison that says, Oh, he is the best. This is the second best. There is no such thing.
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I always had a kind of strange relationship with New York City, with total love affair in the beginning then retreat during the kind of conservatives of politics and real estate and business came, and then I am again kind of fighting for the justice to the city, to open the city for the artists.
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Obviously, the young dancers lack a certain air of maturity.
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He Astaire was not a sexual animal, but he made his partners look so extraordinarily related to him.
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No dancer can watch Fred Astaire and not know that we all should have been in another business.
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I have been very lucky to work in so many new ballets, but that is what a dancer's work is.
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Dancing is my obsession. My life.
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I remember vividly seeing 'Tarzan' and Fred Astaire, the Chaplin films, Fred Astaire musicals, MGM, because of my mother. She was just interested in everything and she took me to opera and ballet, and then ballet got me hooked.
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I've always said, 'I am a selector, I am not defector' - the first few phrases in English I learned. I said I hate 'defector'; something defective about the people. It's a bad word.
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I gave away a lot of works for benefits and then people would also give me back.
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The more injuries you get, the smarter you get.
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I am teaching more. That is what I do best.
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People of art should never get married and have children, because it's a selfish experience.
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Fundamentals are the building blocks of fun.
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We're trying to stretch our muscles creatively. It gives us so much more freedom.
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Nobody is born a dancer.
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I think art education, especially in this country, which government pretty much ignores, is so important for young people.
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When a dancer comes onstage, he is not just a blank slate that the choreographer has written on. Behind him he has all the decisions he has made in life. Each time, he has chosen, and in what he is onstage, you see the result of those choices. You are looking at the person he is, and the person who, at this point, he cannot help but be Exceptional dancers, in my experience, are also exceptional people, people with an attitude toward life, a kind of quest, and an internal quality. They know who they are, and they show this to you, willingly.