Tarantella

I first came across this word in Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House. Nora says, “Tomorrow evening there is to be a fancy-dress ball at the Stenborgs’, who live above us; and Torvald wants me to go as a Neapolitan fisher-girl and, dance the Tarantella that I learned in Capri.” Which fits in with the fact that the family had been in Italy when Torvald was ill. However, most of the examples of the dance that I’ve seen on line involve more than one person. So I wonder how exactly Nora danced it. Symbolic though, in terms of the play, because it is all about a woman leaving her married life to move out on her own, “to think over things ... and get to understand them.” At the same time, there’s the story of Mrs. Linde and Krogstad in the play, too, which we don’t often talk about when the play is discussed. The two of them dance their own metaphor of the tarantella.

I wish Persephone Theatre would put on this play. I saw it once on television and have read it, but would love to see it live. There is so much meat there and excellent roles for several characters.

At any rate, the dance is of Italian origin; my dictionary says the word originates from the seaport town of Taranto, which is often associated with the dancing mania of tarantism. The latter, some say, originated from a type of tarantula spider whose bite caused people to dance very hard in hopes of driving the poison out of their bodies. Looking at the movements of the dance I find this hard to believe, but it makes a good story. Apparently the dance was also at one time seen as a cure for neurotic women. (Possibly another layer of symbolism for Ibsen’s play).

There are various versions of the tarantella in different regions of Italy. Also both group and couple dances. It is generally danced with tambourines and accompanied by drums, flutes, mandolins. To me the dance seems similar other folk dances, to various courting dances.

Walking along the river one fall day a couple of years ago, this came:

Leaves’ last dance today.
Wind whirls them across my path –
A tarantella.