by Shanna Riley

Created on: March 28, 2008

"People do not live nowadays. They get about ten percent out of life."

So sayeth the enigmatic, rebellious, and free-spirited woman who came to be known as the "Mother of Modern Dance", Isadora Duncan.

Isadora danced her way, scantily clad in flowing Greek-styled robes, right out of the corseted restraints of the Victorian era she was born into. She brought with her a freshness and unrestrained way of life, turning the upstanding and moralistic men and women of her time right on their heads. Before her tragic and horrific end in 1927, Isadora had danced her way across the world and on some of Europe's most prestigious stages and for some of its most influential persons, and had three separate children by three different men, all out of wedlock. She lived her life her way and tiptoed barefoot and lightly around the whispers and raised eyebrows of a sedate and principled world.

Long before Miss Duncan danced across Europe or lived among ancient ruins in Greece, however, she was a young, poor American girl with big dreams and an artistic family. The youngest child of a fair weather father, Joseph Charles Duncan, and a pianist, strong-willed mother, Mary Dora Gray, she was born Angela Isadora Duncan on May 27, 1887. Claiming to have "been dancing in her mother's womb", one of Isadora's favorite stories was how her mother, her pregnant stomach turning at every other food, could only dine on caviar and champagne - the food of the Greek goddess Aphrodite - while she her mother carried her. Isadora knew, from a very young age, that she was special and that her ability to express herself through The Dance was a message she would someday deliver to the entire world. Isadora never dreamed small.

Inspired by her forceful visions, Isadora's family worked hard to help her achieve her goals, eventually selling everything they owned to travel together to Chicago, where in 1897 Isadora joined the touring company of theatrical producer, Augustin Daly. After touring England with Daly's company, Isadora and her family packed up and headed to New York, and earned their meager way by performing as a group her mother on piano, Isadora dancing, and her brother, Raymond, reciting poetry and Greek history in the homes of New York's upper class.

Eventually, the wistful, artistic family had enough money saved to embark on a ship to Europe. It was not an extravagant seafaring trip by any means; the Duncans had found passage on a cattle ship, not letting the smell of dung or baying of heifers

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