Ted Shawn

Abstract

Abstract This book is the first critical biography of Ted Shawn (1891–1972), the self-proclaimed “Father of American Dance.” Based on extensive archival research, it offers an in-depth examination of Shawn’s pioneering role in the formation of Denishawn (the first American modern dance company and school), Ted Shawn and His Men Dancers (the first all-male dance company), and Jacob’s Pillow (the internationally renowned dance festival and school located in the Berkshire Hills of Massachusetts). For many years and with great frustration, Shawn attempted to tell the story of his life’s work in terms of its social and artistic value, but struggled, owing to the fact that he was homosexual, something known only within his inner circle of friends. Though Shawn remained closeted, he scrupulously archived his journals, correspondence, programs, photographs, and motion pictures of his dances, anticipating that the full significance of his life, writing, and dances would reveal itself in time. By exploring these materials alongside Shawn’s relationship with contemporary thinkers who were leading a radical movement to depathologize homosexuality, such as the British eugenicist Havelock Ellis, writer Lucien Price, and sexologist Alfred C. Kinsey, this book tells the untold story of how Shawn’s homosexuality informed his extensive body of writings and choreography and, by extension, the history of dance in America.