Twyla Tharp

Dancer and Choreographer

Twyla Tharp: It depends on how you define vision. If it's a sense of the way I enjoyed spending time most was dancing. It was from the time I was a very small child, when I puttered around the house. I was four or five years old, I remember already having a regime. It was the way I always identified myself. If you're speaking of professionally, it was not until I was after college, until I had graduated. So, it was much, much later that I made a professional commitment to it because quite frankly, I didn't think it wise. I was my own interior parental force, and it's very difficult to justify a profession as a dancer because it's very difficult to earn a living; because there's very little continuity, and because just when you arrive at the apex of your skills, it's time to retire. And consequently, it seemed like perhaps a not wise investment of a substantial portion of my life. But as it turned out, I decided that since it was the thing that I felt I did the best, that I owed it to all that be to pursue it. That that was what I had to do, whether it meant I was going to be able to earn a living or not.
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