Emma Livry (born as Jeanne Emma Emarot or Emma Marie Emarot; 24 September 1842 – 26 July 1863) was a French

ballerina A ballet dancer ( it, ballerina fem.; ''ballerino'' masc.) is a person who practices the art of classical ballet. Both females and males can practice ballet; however, dancers have a strict hierarchy and strict gender roles. They rely on ye ...

who was one of the last ballerinas of the Romantic ballet era and a protégée of

Marie Taglioni Marie Taglioni, Comtesse de Voisins (23 April 1804 – 22 April 1884) was a Swedish-born ballet dancer of the Romantic ballet era partially of Italian descent, a central figure in the history of European dance. She spent most of her life in t ...

. She died from complications after burn injuries sustained when her costume caught fire during a rehearsal.

Biography

Livry was the illegitimate daughter of Célestine Emarot, a ballet dancer, and Baron

Charles de Chassiron Baron Charles Gustave Martin de Chassiron (1818-1871) was a French diplomat of the 19th century. He travelled to China and Japan as one of the two ''Attachés'' of the French Embassy under Jean-Baptiste Louis Gros, Baron Gros, with the title of ...

, which prompted the following rhyming verse: :Can so skinny a '' rat'' :Be the daughter of so round a cat?

Career

She studied dancing under Madame Dominique and attended the Paris Opera School. Her career was promoted by her mother's lover at the time, Vicomte Ferdinand de Montguyon. On 19 October 1858, at the age of sixteen, she made her debut with the Paris Opera Ballet at the

Salle Le Peletier The Salle Le Peletier or Lepeletier (sometimes referred to as the Salle de la rue Le Peletier or the Opéra Le Peletier) was the home of the Paris Opera from 1821 until the building was destroyed by fire in 1873. The theatre was designed and con ...

as the

sylph A sylph (also called sylphid) is an air spirit stemming from the 16th-century works of Paracelsus, who describes sylphs as (invisible) beings of the air, his elementals of air. A significant number of subsequent literary and occult works have bee ...

in ''

La Sylphide ''La Sylphide'' ( en, The Sylph; da, Sylfiden) is a romantic ballet in two acts. There were two versions of the ballet; the original choreographed by Filippo Taglioni in 1832, and a second version choreographed by August Bournonville in 1836. ...

''. Her talent brought her fame and she became a widely respected ballerina. Montguyon prevailed upon the director of the Opera to change the programme so that

(who originated the role) would see Livry in ''La Sylphide'' when she visited. Taglioni decided to stay on in Paris to teach the girl, who reminded her of herself as a young woman. She choreographed for Livry the title-role of Farfalla (Butterfly) in '' Le Papillon'', the only full-length ballet composed by

Jacques Offenbach Jacques Offenbach (, also , , ; 20 June 18195 October 1880) was a German-born French composer, cellist and impresario of the Romantic period. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s to the 1870s, and his uncompleted opera ' ...

. The sculptor

Jean-Auguste Barre Jean Auguste Barre (25 September 1811 – 5 February 1896) was a French sculptor and medalist. Born in Paris, he was trained by his father Jean-Jacques Barre (1793–1855), a medalist. Barre studied at the École nationale supérieure des Be ...

created a figurine of Livry in this role in bronze and bisque versions. Paul Smith wrote in ''

Revue et gazette musicale de Paris The ' was a weekly musical review founded in 1827 by the Belgian musicologist, teacher and composer François-Joseph Fétis, then working as professor of counterpoint and fugue at the Conservatoire de Paris. It was the first French-language jo ...

'':

Accidental death

On 15 November 1862, Livry was rehearsing the title role of Fenella, a

mime Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) is an Internet standard that extends the format of email messages to support text in character sets other than ASCII, as well as attachments of audio, video, images, and application programs. Message ...

part and the title role in Auber's opera ''

La muette de Portici ''La muette de Portici'' (''The Mute Girl of Portici'', or ''The Dumb Girl of Portici''), also called ''Masaniello'' () in some versions, is an opera in five acts by Daniel Auber, with a libretto by Germain Delavigne, revised by Eugène Scr ...

''. Making her second-act entrance, she shook out her skirts, which caught fire on a gaslight. The accident was avoidable: a method of fire-proofing costumes was available in this period, but Livry and most female performers of the period were opposed to it because it discolored and stiffened fabrics.Roger L. Williams, ''Gaslight and Shadow: The World of Napoleon III'' (NY: Macmillan, 1957), 106. Fire-proofing was required by an imperial decree of 27 November 1859. In 1860 a dancer's costume had caught fire during rehearsals for Offenbach's ''Le Papillon'' which starred Livry. In flames, she ran across the stage three times before she was caught and the fire extinguished with the help of firemen and other dancers. Her burns were more extensive than deep. She had clasped the burning fabric to her torso out of modesty. Melle Emma Livry, dans Herculanum

Her face and breasts were undamaged. According to the doctor in attendance, her thighs, waist, back, shoulders and arms were burned, and her stays were burned on. She tried to pray. Taglioni, who was watching the rehearsal, rubbed make-up grease into her wounds in the mistaken belief that it would act as ointment. She suffered for months, yet remained opposed to fire-proofed skirts: "Yes, they are, as you say, less dangerous, but should I ever return to the stage, I would never think of wearing them – they are so ugly." In 1863, she was moved from her home in Paris to Neuilly-sur-Seine. Her wounds re-opened and she succumbed to septicæmia. Montguyon was with her when she died. She was only 20 years old. After a funeral at Notre Dame de Lorette in Paris, she was buried in the

Cimetière de Montmartre The Cemetery of Montmartre (french: link=no, Cimetière de Montmartre) is a cemetery in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, France, that dates to the early 19th century. Officially known as the Cimetière du Nord, it is the third largest necropolis ...

. The surviving scraps of her costume can be seen in the Musée de l'Opéra in Paris.

References

Notes

Sources and further reading

*M. Quatrelles L'Epine, "Une danseuse française au XIXe siècle: Emma Livry", ''Bulletin de la Société de l'Histoire du Théâtre'' (Paris, November 1908 – January 1909), pp. 7–47. *Guest, Ivor, ''The Ballet of the Second Empire'' (London, 1955)
Guest, Ivor, "Centenary: Emma Livry, 1842–1863", in ''The Ballet Annual & Year Book'', Mary Clarke & Arnold Haskell, eds., (New York & London, 1963), pp. 54–60

External links

Bernard Vassor: Emma Livry, une histoire tragique à l'opéraChristina Towle: Emma Livry
{{DEFAULTSORT:Livry, Emma 1842 births 1863 deaths Paris Opera Ballet étoiles Burials at Montmartre Cemetery Accidental deaths in France Deaths from fire Deaths from sepsis Prima ballerinas French ballerinas