Ballet Folklore

The mischievous, shapeshifting troublemakers from Irish and Celtic legend, púca, are thought to bring both good and bad fortune, depending on their mood. Also called pooka, puka and  phouka, this unpredictable magical creature will often appear in the form an animal with jet black fur. Puca have been known to transform into horses, goats, cats, donkeys, bulls, dogs, foxes, wolves, and hares, and are associated with the pagan holiday of Halloween. The main point of similarity across all the different versions and tales of the púca are their innate love of mischief, most deftly represented in William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream in the trickster imp character, Puck. 

While the exact origin story of Odette in ballet’s Swan Lake is unknown, there is no shortage of folktales that include jealousy, betrayal and a curse that transforms a human into an animal. In the Irish legend, Oidheadh Chlainne Lir (The Children of Lir), the jealous second wife of King Lir, Queen Aoife, nailed the wicked stepmother stereotype by cursing Lir’s four children from his first wife (her sister!) Eva. Aoife used her magical powers to transform all the children into swans but left them their beautiful singing voices in a moment of compassion. Forced to live as this way for 900 years, the spell could only be broken when the children heard the bells ringing signalling the arrival of St Patrick in Ireland. 

The twin brother of Artemis, Apollo is the ancient Greek god of archery, music and oracles. He is usually depicted as a handsome young man, often with a laurel wreath, a lyre or arrows. In George Balanchine’s ballet, Apollo is visited by three muses: Terpsichore, the muse of dance and song; Polyhymnia, the muse of mime; and Calliope, the muse of poetry.  Apollo dances with all three muses, giving each of them a gift that symbolises their art: Terpsichore receives a lyre, Calliope is given a stone tablet, and Polyhymnia a mask.

In Roman mythology, Rhea Silvia is the mother of Romulus and Remus, the twins who founded the city of Rome. The name Silvia comes from the Latin word ‘Silva', meaning ‘forest'. In the 2019 ballet Sylvia, by Stanton Welch, the heroine is an adventurous wood nymph under the command of the Greek goddess of hunting and wilderness, Artemis. Joined by a mischievous mortal Psyche, Welch’s retelling of the intertwined myths first premiered in Paris in 1876 by choreographer Louis Mérante to music by Léo Delibes. The three stories of Sylvia, Artemis and Psyche are connected by Eros (Cupid in Roman mythology). Eros shoots Sylvia with his arrow, causing her to fall in love with a mortal shepherd in an act strictly forbidden by Artemis, and Eros himself falls in love with Psyche, whose divine beauty has surpassed that of his mother, the goddess of love Aphrodite, to her fury. It's a mythological adventure unlike anything else!

The illustrious Firebird folktale has been told for centuries. Originating in Slavic lore, the firebird is a magical and prophetic creature that can bring either good fortune or ruin to anyone who tries to capture it. The many versions of The Firebird include Alexander Afanasyev’s 19th-century collection of fairytales that wrote of a bird with “golden feathers, while its eyes were like unto oriental crystal” and The Brother’s Grimm story The Golden Bird. The most famous firebird, however, is Sergei Diaghilev's creation for the Ballet Russe. Set to a score by Igor Stravinsky, Diaghilev’s The Firebird tells the tale of a half-bird/half-woman captured by a prince. When the prince sets her free, the Firebird gives him one of her magical feathers in gratitude, allowing him to defeat the wicked Koshchei the Immortal.