Nicholas Arthur Dromgoole (3 December 1927 – 20 September 2023) was a British ballet critic.

Biography

Born in

Maranhão Maranhão () is a States of Brazil, state in Brazil. Located in the country's Northeast Region, Brazil, Northeast Region, it has a population of about 7 million and an area of and it is divided into 217 municipalities. Clockwise from north, it ...

, Brazil, he was the third son of Nicholas Arthur Dromgoole, a Civil Service telegraphist, and Violet Brookes. The family relocated to

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

during Dromgoole's infancy. Dromgoole attended

Dulwich College Dulwich College is a 2-18 private, day and boarding school for boys in Dulwich, London, England. As a public school, it began as the College of God's Gift, founded in 1619 by Elizabethan actor Edward Alleyn, with the original purpose of ...

and later

Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...

's St Edmund Hall, where he studied

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

. At Oxford, he was a member of the University Ballet Club, joining peers such as Clement Crisp, John Percival, and Clive Barnes. After a brief period of study at the Sorbonne and a personal tragedy, Dromgoole established an educational institution in England. By the age of 27, he served as headmaster of

Pierrepont School, Frensham Pierrepont School, Frensham, originally known as Pierrepont House School, was a private school in Surrey, England, with day pupils as well as boarders. Founded in 1947 as a school for boys, it became co-educational in 1983 and closed in 1993. ...

. One of his students, Robert North, would later become a prominent ballet choreographer. In 1962, Dromgoole moved to

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, assuming the chairmanship of the Institute of Choreology, later known as the Benesh Institute. He also introduced a humanities department at the Sir John Cass College, where he remained for four decades. Concurrently, he managed the college's rugby team. By 1965, Dromgoole was appointed a ballet critic for ''

The Sunday Telegraph ''The Sunday Telegraph'' is a British broadsheet newspaper, first published on 5 February 1961 and published by the Telegraph Media Group, a division of Press Holdings. It is the sister paper of ''The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Tele ...

'', a position he held for three decades. During this tenure, he covered significant developments in ballet, including the trajectory of the Royal Ballet and the growth of contemporary British dance companies. Dromgoole's personal life included a marriage to ballet dancer

Lesley Collier Lesley Faye Collier (born 13 March 1947) is an English people, English ballerina and teacher of dance. In 1972 she became a principal dancer of the Royal Ballet. In 1995 she left the company and began to teach at the Royal Ballet School. She is ...

in 1977. Professionally, he authored several books on subjects ranging from the role of critics to the language of gesture in theatre. Additionally, he provided introductions for a number of classic plays. Dromgoole was a member of the Garrick Club in London.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dromgoole, Nicholas 1927 births 2023 deaths Ballet critics People from Maranhão