Mark Morris

This book is the first to seriously take stock of Morris, who is widely considered to be the leading modern dance choreographer of his generation. Born in Seattle, Wash., in 1956, Morris lived there, in the author's view, as a more or less contented iconoclast before heading for New York City in 1976 and dancing with several companies, then starting the Mark Morris Dance Group in 1980. Acocella devotes chapters to the preoccupations of his work, its themes (e.g., ``irony and sincerity'') and fundamental character, and others to the character of the choreographer himself as seen in the context of his career. One of the most absorbing chapters is largely narrative--``Brussels,'' telling of Morris's (``Mr. Outrageous'') difficult years from 1988 to 1991 in conservative Belgium, where he was splendidly set up in the Theatre Royal de la Monnaie as dance director. But Acocella is also an acute observer of the dances themselves, and goes beyond them to venture general thoughts on dancing that linger in the mind (``What makes most classical art interesting is not an achieved balance but a struggle for balance''). Photos not seen by PW. (Dec.)