Noverre in Translation

Spanish and Italian translation of Noverre's famous Lettres sur la danse, et sur les ballets (1760) did not appear in print in monograph format until the 20th century. Yet Noverre's ideas became ubiquitous nonetheless, and in many cases came to stand in for ideas about the ballet d'action in general, despite, in particular, intense Franco-Italian debates on the matter. This presentation will trace how, via translation of Charles-Joseph Panckoucke's Encyclopédie méthodique, Noverre's letters circulated in French and Italian over 150 years prior to their issuance in standalone editions in these languages. Yet ie will also examine what it means for a text to be translated as part of a larger whole, asking how the appearance of Noverre's words - disassociated from his mane - in the Artes académicos volume of the Enciclopedia metódica (1791) and Antonio Piazza's Venetian newspaper, the Gazzetta Urbana Veneta (1794), came to affect the perception of Enlightenment ballet as the very trends underpinning the ballet d'action began to shift in new directions. 

About the author

Olivia Sabee is Assistant Professor of Dance at Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania, USA. She holds a B.A. in French from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. in French from John Hopkins University and was an exchange student at the Ecole normale supérieure and Oxford University. Situated at the intersections of literature, history, and dance, her work examines the ways in which 18th- and 19th-century French ballet engages with questions about language and society. Her articles have appeared in publications including Eighteenth-Century Studies, Dance Chronicle, and Romance Studies. She is particularly interested in the ways in which the publishing industry shaped the dissemination and reception of early modern dance texts and subsequently early modern dance theory, the subject of her book manuscript, Ballet in the Age of the Encyclopédie. She is also preparing a second project on the corps de ballet in 19th-century France.