Dancer Martha Graham trained her body to move in different ways and in different contexts from any before attempted, "life today is nervous, sharp, and zigzag," she said. "It often stops in midair. That is what I aim for in my dances." She insists she never started out to be a rebel. It was only that the emotions she had to express could not be projected through any of the traditional forms.
This was in 1925. All forms of art were undergoing a revolution. The theories of psychology were being used to extend the boundaries of poetry, music, and painting.
Martha Graham's debut dance concert in her new idiom occurred on April 18, 1926. Connoisseurs of dance, gathered at the Forty-eighth Street Theater in New York, witnessed Martha Graham's first foray into this new realm of dance. They saw, through such dance sequences as "Three Gobi Maidens." and "A Study in Lacquer, desires and conflicts expressed through bodily movements. These critics agreed that something entirely new. a departure from all previous forms, had been witnessed.
In the early thirties, she founded the. Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance. Her classes were used as a laboratory for her stage works, and her stage works in turn were a means for attaching new pupils to her school-a sort of self-winding process, with herself as the key to the development.
Martha Graham and the school she has founded are virtually synonymous with the modern dance. She had not only produced a technique of the dance. choreographed and taught it, but her disciples have gone out to fill the modern dance world.
1. What does the passage mainly discuss.
(A) Martha Graham' S development of modern dance
(B) The revolution of art forms in the i920' s
(C) A dancer's view of life
(D) The Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance
2. It can be inferred from the passage that in the beginning of her career, Martha Graham’s mode of dance was
(A) readily accepted (B) considered rebellious
(C) virtually ignored (D) accepted only in New York
3. It can be inferred from the passage that Martha Graham's style of dance differed from traditional dance in the
(A) type of movements (B) speed of the performance
(C) variety of themes (D) ages of the performers
4. In lines 16, the author uses the phrase "a sort of self-winding process" to illustrate
(A) the new steps Graham developed for dance
(B) the relationship between Graham's performances and her school
(C) the discipline demanded in Graham's school
(D) the physical endurance of Graham' 3 dancers
5. According to the passage, what is the present status of Martha Graham's work?
(A) It is historically interesting, but is no longer popular.
(B) It has evolved into something completely different.
(C) It is carried on by her students.
(D) It causes heated debates
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