The Last Years of Nijinsky

VASLAV NIJINSKY, the greatest male dancer of all time, had a meteoric career, which lasted in all just ten years and ended abruptly when he was declared insane in March, 1919, in Zurich.

He was only twenty-nine when he was forced to discontinue his profession.

The five years he danced in his native Russia and the five years abroad, in Europe and North and South America, were sufficient to establish him as among the immortals of the dance. I have told the story of this career-its origin, its great ten years, and its ending-in my book, Nijinsky, published in 1934. But my husband continued to live, and I to live with him, till his death in London in April, 1950.

It seems to me both necessary and desirable, for the sake of the history of art and genius, and to help preserve the memory of the greatest and kindest human being I have ever known, to tell the remainder of his story. It is the story of twenty-seven years of the twilight of a god-years of misery, often of heartbreak, but years so inspired by the presence of a great and kind spirit, whatever the state of his mental health, that I never for a moment regretted my decision to remain with my husband even when the best medical advice assured me there was no chance of recovery. — Romola Nijinsky