The Little Humpbacked Horse (ballet)

The Little Humpbacked Horse, or The Tsar Maiden (a.k.a. Konyok Gorbunok ili Tsar-Devitsa, or Le Petit cheval bossu, ou La Tsar-Demoiselle) is a ballet in four acts and eight scenes with apotheosis.

The libretto is by Arthur Saint-Léon, based on the fairy tale The Little Humpbacked Horse by Pyotr Yershov. However, the choreographer substantially deviated from Yershov's original tale. The ballet shows how Ivan the fool, with the aid of a magical horse, defeats an evil Khan and wins the hand of the Tsar- Maiden. Eventually Ivan replaces the ineffective and incompetent Tsar and becomes Tsar himself.

The original choreography was created by Arthur Saint-Léon, and was set to music by Cesare Pugni.

The ballet was first presented by the Imperial Ballet on 15 December [O.S. 3 December] 1864 at the Imperial Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia. Marfa Muravyova (as the Tsar Maiden) and Timofey Stukolkin (as Ivanushka) were planned as principal performers. However, Stukolkin had broken his leg and was replaced with Nilolay Troitsky, who had no previous experience of dancing principal roles.

The ballet became an important milestone in the development of Russian ballet. It was the first ballet based on a Russian story. Composer Pugni included Russian folk songs in the music for the ballet, and choreographer Arthur Saint-Léon created specifically Russian folk dancing - overall 22 Russian folk dances were staged. However, the French choreographer was not very knowledgeable in Russian folk dancing, and invented many of them himself, including the "Ural dance" . The ballet was very colorful and was a huge success.

Russian democratic critics such as Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin and Nikolay Nekrasov however strongly criticized the work. They viewed the ballet as a pathetic parody of Russian dances rather than a genuine collection of dances, and accused the choreographer of being mediocre, the audience of tastelessness, Tsar Alexander II of having a criminal attitude to his people, and all of them together of a lack of understanding of social development.

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