Bala: Dancer of Grace and Beauty

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Notes

A snippet of a 1976 film by Satyajit Ray of Bala dancing on the beach is available on YouTube. A DVD, Balasarawati, apparently the only film on record, is available from World Music Archives, Olin Library, Wesleyen University, Middletown, Conn., 06459.

By the end of the nineteenth century, the temple dance tradition had fallen into ill repute because its artistic quality had deteriorated and the women who performed it were considered prostitutes.

The Theosophists initially rejected bharata natyam on moral grounds, but their involvement in the Indian independence movement led to their understanding of the dance as part of the national cultural heritage.

1. V. K. Narayana Menon, Balasaraswati (New Delhi, India: Inter-National Culture Center, n.d.).

2. Sunil Kothari, Bharata Natyam (Mumbai, India: Marg Publications, 1979), p. 28.