If I have left the audience with some idea of the performance, I seldom have the strength or the intention to give them any more of that performance at the stage door. There is nothing left; the job is finished. Yet often the audience expects you to continue the image you have given them. They don't understand that there is no longer any relation between me and them except an empty shell. After one performance someone said that she wanted to replace Miss Julie because she felt so involved. Well, that is like it should be - a love affair. Jean is a character that is quite appealing to a lot of women. He is brutal and seductive and what have you. This of course is what the role demands and it does not feel alien to me while I am playing him. Off-stage I am not necessarily that or only that.
Or if I have made the audience feel light-headed - like when I dance Flower Festival - because I have to create such an idea of doing it for sheer joy that I must burst with some kind of life. Well, after the energy it takes to project that, there is no life left in me right away. Anyone who hangs around my dressing room then is likely to get a door right bang in his nose. He'd better wait till I get some life back, even just my breathing. They think this is so natural it must be unlimited. It is quite natural - while it lasts. It's my job to sustain that feeling or atmosphere or idea as long as the curtain is up. Yet here they are waiting to see this idea which did not exist except there at that moment.

Это отрывок из книги Эрика Beyond Technique. Ну, а фотография - из фотобука Ballet and Modern Dance (1974 год), моего последнего копенгагенского приобретения: Эрик и Карла в "Фестивале цветов в Дженцано". Два года назад я вывешивала у себя отрывок из статьи Дорис Херинг в февральском Dance Magazine за 1969 год, где, среди всего прочего, Херинг писала и о "Фестивале цветов" в исполнении Карлы и Эрика (а еще о "Коппелии" с ними же). Приятно теперь перечитать - под эту фотографию.