Editorial Introduction. Margaret M. McGowan: Pioneer of Academic Dance Research

Abstract

Editorial Introduction. Margaret M. McGowan:Pioneer of Academic Dance Research Margaret McGowan has been closely associated with all editorial aspects of the scholarly journal Dance Research almost since its first issue in 1982. For most of the life of the journal she has served as Assistant Editor, involved in the development of its editorial policies, the establishing of its reputation for high standards, and its gradual encompassing of the full range of dance research activity. The years of the journal have been years of considerable expansion within dance studies and research, throughout which Margaret has remained a highly respected and stable point of reference to scholars from widely differing backgrounds. In recognition of her contribution to the journal in its twenty-fifth year and her contribution to dance research more generally, this special issue has been planned to reflect the range and quality of her work, and that of others working in the early modern period – both dance scholars and specialists in cognate disciplines. The principal focus for the issue is the period with which Margaret has been professionally concerned, French culture in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It is ironic that this work – with all that Margaret and her professional career has stood for – has done so much to support the development of dance studies in Britain: a development that has not been found in France itself. This is not to say that the quality of her research has failed to attract the admiration of French scholars – or their formative support. André Chastel (a Professor at the Sorbonne), in introducing the 'companion study' to Margaret's first book, Marie-Françoise Christout's Le Ballet de cour de Louis XIV (published in 1967), showed a very keen appreciation of the respective and very different strengths of these two works. For in her work, published three years earlier, Margaret had evinced an interest in the political context of dance, in seeing ballet as the product of a culture, an interdisciplinary form that resonatedwith the political aspirations of the time; she was less interested in dance as spectacular entertainment, and the production side of ballet. The roots of this precociously modern emphasis in her work are, doubtless, partly innate and partly the result of early influences upon her. The young Miss McGowan was an undergraduate at the University of Reading, which, at that time was distinguished by the presence of such important scholars as Frank Kermode, J. B. Trapp, and Donald Gordon, at an early stage of their academic careers; there, she developed an interest in interdisciplinary approaches, and in [End Page 87] looking at the connections between painting, music, theatre, dance and décor. These interests were encouraged further by her experiences at the University of Strasbourg, where she spent a year of her university course and took a French degree. She found this vibrant and forward-looking border city, imbued with both French and German culture, a place of stimulation and varied artistic and intellectual activity. The lively atmosphere of Strasbourg assisted her in widening her sympathies and seeing connections between the visual and performing arts and between them and the culture from which they arose. She thought carefully before deciding where to apply her scholarly attention, identifying two periods that lent themselves to her interdisciplinary and politico-cultural approach: the transitional period at the end of the sixteenth century and the beginning of the seventeenth century, and the fin-de-siècle period at the end of the nineteenth century. She chose the earlier option: in this period, French literature had absorbed the classical heritage 'but was not sure where it was going' – it was a 'melting pot' – the arts were in transition before they found their 'pure' form. Margaret McGowan embarked upon her doctoral research under the supervision of Frances Yates, the formidably learned grande dame of the Warburg Institute (University of London). Frances Yates initially proved to be a rather idiosyncratic supervisor. Given her scholarly predilections, Miss Yates would always be seeking to find cabbalistic mysteries – 'unseen meanings' – concealed in the material being investigated by her student, who would have to insist, repeatedly, that there was 'nothing there'. But once Miss McGowan startedto produce...