Введение
Американский танцор (ок. 1825 – ок. 1852/53)
Master Juba (ca. 1825 – ca. 1852 or 1853) was an African American dancer active in the 1840s. He was one of the first black performers in the United States to play onstage for white audiences and the only one of the era to tour with a white minstrel group. His real name was believed to be William Henry Lane, and he was also known as "Boz's Juba" following Dickens's graphic description of him in American Notes. As a teenager, he began his career in the rough saloons and dance halls of Manhattan's Five Points neighborhood, moving on to minstrel shows in the mid 1840s. "Master Juba" frequently challenged and defeated the best white dancers, including the period favorite, John Diamond. At the height of his American career, Juba's act featured a sequence in which he imitated a series of famous dancers of the day and closed by performing in his own style. Being a black man, he appeared with minstrel troupes in which he imitated white minstrel dancers caricaturing black dance, obscuring his underlying ethnic identity with blackface Even with his success in America, his greatest success came in England. In 1848 "Boz's Juba" traveled to London with the Ethiopian Serenaders, an otherwise white minstrel troupe. Boz's Juba became a sensation in Britain for his dance style. He was a critical favorite and the most written about performer of the 1848 season. Nevertheless, an element of exploitation followed him through the British Isles, with writers treating him as an exhibit on display. Records next place Juba in both Britain and America in the early 1850s. His American critics were less kind, and Juba faded from the limelight. He died in 1852 or 1853, likely from overwork and malnutrition. Scant details appear in primary sources, and secondary sources—most dating to years after his death—are of dubious validity. Dance historian Marian Hannah Winter proposed that Juba was born to free parents in 1825 or later. Showman Michael B. Leavitt wrote in 1912 that Juba came from Providence, Rhode Island, and theater historian T. Allston Brown gives his real name as William Henry Lane. According to an item in the August 11, 1895 edition of the New York Herald, Juba lived in New York's Five Points District. The Irish and black populations intermingled and borrowed elements of folk culture from each other. One area of exchange was dance, and the Irish jig blended with black folk steps. In this environment, Juba learned to dance from his peers, Winter speculated that by about age 15, Juba had no family. "Jube" and "Juba" were common names for slaves in this period, especially those rumored to have dancing or musical talent. For example, in 1840 a man named Lewis Davis was using the name "Master Juber" and making his living "travelling through the states, dancing negro extravaganzas, breakdowns, &c". He was arrested for theft in New York City. An anonymous letter from 1841 or early 1842 in the tabloid newspaper the Sunday Flash states that Juba was working for showman P. T. Barnum. The writer stated that Barnum had managed the dancer since 1840, when he had disguised the boy as a white minstrel performer—by making him up in blackface—and put him on at the New York Vauxhall Gardens. In 1841, the letter alleges, Barnum went so far as to present his charge as the Irish American performer John Diamond, the most celebrated dancer of the day. The letter further accuses Barnum of entering Juba as Diamond in rigged dance competitions against other performers:
The boy is fifteen or sixteen years of age; his name is "Juba;" and to do him justice, he is a very fair dancer. He is of harmless and inoffensive disposition, and is not, I sincerely believe, aware of the meanness and audacity of the swindler to which he is presently a party. As to the wagers which the bills daily blazon forth, they are like the rest of his business—all a cheat. Not one dollar is ever bet or staked, and the pretended judges who aid in the farce, are mere blowers. Writer Thomas Low Nichols supported parts of the story in an 1864 book of social history. He states that in 1841 Diamond quit his work as a dancer in the employ of Barnum and was replaced by "a genuine negro", whom Barnum billed as "the champion nigger dancer of the world". Nichols never identified the dancer as Juba, but later writers concluded that the boy was that performer. Historian Eric Lott has identified the irony of this arrangement: a black man imitating a white man imitating a black man. Beginning in the early 1840s, Juba began a series of dance competitions known as challenge dances. He faced white rival John Diamond, who advertised that he "delineate[d] the Ethiopian character superior to any other white person". Sources disagree about the date of their first contest; it may have occurred while Diamond was still working for Barnum or a year or two later. This advertisement from the July 8, 1844, New York Herald is typical of the publicity the matches generated:
GREAT PUBLIC CONTEST
Between the two most renowned dancers in the world, the Original JOHN DIAMOND and the colored boy JUBA, for a Wager of $200, on MONDAY EVENING July 8 at the BOWERY AMPHITHEATRE, which building has been expressly hired from the Proprietor, Mr. Smith, for this night only, as its accommodations will afford all a fair view of each step of these wonderful Dancers. The fame of these two Celebrated Breakdown Dancers has already spread over the Union, and the numerous friends of each claim the Championship for their favorite, and who have anxiously wished for a Public Trial between them and thus known which is to bear the Title of the Champion Dancer of the World. The time to decide that has come, as the friends of Juba have challenged the world to produce his superior in the art for $100. That Challenge has been accepted by the friends of Diamond, and on Monday Evening they meet and Dance three Jigs, Two Reels, and the Camptown Hornpipe. Five Judges have been selected for their ability and knowledge of the Art, so that a fair decision will be made. Rule—Each Dancer will select his own Violin and the victory will be decided by the best time and the greatest number of steps. Historian James W. Cook has suggested that Juba and Diamond may have staged their first competition as a form of mutual publicity. Claims of black superiority over an acclaimed white rival were otherwise unheard of in the climate of racial segregation and white supremacy that permeated New York City and the country at large in the mid 1840s. After the dance, they compared notes and chose the winner. Audience members and friends of the competitors bet on the outcome and could name the victor by popular acclaim in the case the judges could not come to a decision. According to an undated reference by Leavitt, Juba lost one challenge, at the Boylston Gardens in Boston, but records show that he beat Diamond in all other competitions. An undated clipping from the Harvard Theatre Collection, written by a fan of minstrelsy, describes the single dance competition that Diamond managed to win: "One of the fiddlers played a reel for him [Juba], and he shuffled, and twisted, and walked around, and danced on for one hour and fifteen minutes by the watch." Then Juba made a loud strike with his left foot as the crowd cheered and he got a drink from the bar. Diamond was next and tried to act cool but resolute. He knew that he would displease Barnum by losing and he had his race at stake: "There was another thing about this match dance that made Diamond want to win. You see it was not only a case of Barnum's Museum against Pete Williams's dance house, but it was a case of white against black. So Jack Diamond went at his dancin' with double energy—first, for his place, next, for his color." He beat Juba's time and "gave a hop, skip and a jump, a yell and a bow". A black man shouted out, "He's a white man, sure but he's got a nigger in his heel." The two had their most famous matchup in New York City in 1844, where Juba beat Diamond for $500. Juba then traveled to Boston, billing himself as the "King of All the Dancers", and played for two weeks, with competitions versus Frank Diamond (no relation to John). In 1842, English writer Charles Dickens toured New York's Five Points. This was around the time of the challenge dances, and Dickens was possibly drawn by rumors of Barnum's disguising of a black youth as a white minstrel performer. There the writer witnessed a performance by "a lively young negro" at the Almack's tavern and brothel at 67 Orange Street in the infamous Mulberry Bend. The November 11, 1842, edition of the New York Herald later identified this dancer as Juba. Dickens wrote in his American Notes,
The corpulent black fiddler, and his friend who plays the tambourine, stamp upon the boarding of the small raised orchestra in which they sit, and play a lively measure. Five or six couples come upon the floor, marshalled by a lively young negro, who is the wit of the assembly, and the greatest dancer known. He never leaves off making queer faces, and is the delight of all the rest, who grin from ear to ear incessantly
But the dance commences. Every gentleman sets as long as he likes to the opposite lady, and the opposite lady to him, and all are so long about it that the sport begins to languish, when suddenly the lively hero dashes in to the rescue. Instantly the fiddler grins, and goes at it tooth and nail; there is new energy in the tambourine; new laughter in the dancers; new smiles in the landlady; new confidence in the landlord; new brightness in the very candles. Single shuffle, double shuffle, cut and cross cut; snapping his fingers, rolling his eyes, turning in his knees, presenting the backs of his legs in front, spinning about on his toes and heels like nothing but the man's fingers on the tambourine; dancing with two left legs, two right legs, two wooden legs, two wire legs, two spring legs—all sorts of legs and no legs—what is this to him? And in what walk of life, or dance of life, does man ever get such stimulating applause as thunders about him, when, having danced his partner off her feet, and himself too, he finishes by leaping gloriously on the bar counter, and calling for something to drink, with the chuckle of a million of counterfeit Jim Crows, in one inimitable sound! Juba may have capitalized on the free publicity given him by Dickens as he made the jump from the saloon to the stage.</blockquote>
In this performance, Juba imitated the white minstrel performers Richard Pelham, Frank Brower, John Daniels, John Smith, James Sanford, Frank Diamond, and John Diamond. The idea that Juba could "imitate himself" after mimicking his rivals points up, according to Lott, "minstrelsy's fundamental consequence for black culture, the dispossession and control by whites of black forms that would not for a long time be recovered". and his fame soared. He toured through New England with the Georgia Champion Minstrels in 1844. In 1845, Juba began touring with the Ethiopian Minstrels. The troupe gave him top billing over its four white members, unprecedented for a black performer. He played a character named Ikey Vanjacklen, "the barber's boy" in a piece called "Going for the Cup, or, Old Mrs. Williams's Dance", one of the earliest known minstrel sketches. It focused on Juba's dancing in a milieu of competition and showing off. The plot follows two characters trying to fix a dance contest by soaping the floor in a way that will make all of the competitors fall except Ikey. They bet on Vanjacklen, but in the end, the judge steals the money.
Мастер Джуба (ок. 1825 – ок. 1852 или 1853) – афроамериканский танцор, активно выступавший в 1840-х годах. Он был одним из первых темнокожих исполнителей в Соединенных Штатах, выступавших на сцене перед белой публикой, и единственным в ту эпоху, гастролировавшим с белой труппой минстрелей. Его настоящее имя, предположительно, Уильям Генри Лэйн, и он также был известен как «Джуба Боза» после яркого описания его Диккенсом в «Американских заметках». В подростковом возрасте он начал свою карьеру в неблагополучных салунах и танцевальных залах манхэттенского района Файв-Пойнтс, а затем перешел к выступлениям в шоу минстрелей в середине 1840-х годов. «Мастер Джуба» часто вызывал на поединок и побеждал лучших белых танцоров, включая популярного в то время Джона Даймонда. На пике своей американской карьеры в его выступлении был номер, в котором он имитировал ряд известных танцоров того времени и завершал его исполнением в собственном стиле. Будучи темнокожим, он выступал с труппами, где имитировал белых танцоров, карикатурирующих черный танец, скрывая свою этническую принадлежность гримом. Несмотря на успех в Америке, наибольший успех пришел к нему в Англии. В 1848 году «Джуба Боза» отправился в Лондон с труппой «Эфиопские серенадеры», состоявшей в основном из белых минстрелей. «Джуба Боза» стал сенсацией в Британии благодаря своему танцевальному стилю. Он был любимцем критики и самым обсуждаемым исполнителем сезона 1848 года. Тем не менее, элемент эксплуатации преследовал его на Британских островах, и писатели относились к нему как к диковине. Записи указывают, что в начале 1850-х годов Джуба выступал как в Британии, так и в Америке. Американские критики были менее благосклонны, и Джуба постепенно сошел со сцены. Он умер в 1852 или 1853 году, вероятно, от переутомления и недоедания. В первоисточниках содержится мало информации, а вторичные источники, большинство из которых датируются годами после его смерти, вызывают сомнения в достоверности. Историк танца Мариан Ханна Винтер предположила, что Джуба родился в семье свободных людей в 1825 году или позже. Шоумен Майкл Б. Ливитт в 1912 году писал, что Джуба родом из Провиденса, штат Род-Айленд, а театральный историк Т. Олстон Браун называет его настоящее имя Уильям Генри Лэйн. Согласно статье в New York Herald от 11 августа 1895 года, Джуба жил в районе Файв-Пойнтс в Нью-Йорке. Ирландское и афроамериканское население смешивалось и заимствовало элементы народной культуры друг у друга. Областью обмена был танец, где ирландский джиг смешивался с афроамериканскими народными шагами. В этой среде Джуба учился танцевать у своих сверстников. Винтер предположила, что к 15 годам у Джубы не осталось семьи. Имена «Джуб» и «Джуба» были распространены среди рабов в этот период, особенно среди тех, кто, по слухам, обладал танцевальными или музыкальными способностями. Например, в 1840 году человек по имени Льюис Дэвис использовал имя «Мастер Джубер» и зарабатывал на жизнь «путешествиями по штатам, исполнением негритянских экстраваганц, брейкдаунов и т. д.». Его арестовали за кражу в Нью-Йорке. В анонимном письме, опубликованном в 1841 или начале 1842 года в таблоиде Sunday Flash, утверждалось, что Джуба работал на шоумена П. Т. Барнума. Автор утверждал, что Барнум управлял танцором с 1840 года, когда замаскировал мальчика под белого исполнителя минстрель-шоу, нагримировав его и представив в нью-йоркских Vauxhall Gardens. В письме утверждается, что в 1841 году Барнум даже представил его как ирландского американского танцора Джона Даймонда, самого знаменитого танцора того времени. В письме также Барнума обвиняют в том, что он выставлял Джубу под именем Даймонда в сфальсифицированных танцевальных конкурсах против других исполнителей: мальчику было пятнадцать или шестнадцать лет; его звали «Джуба»; и, справедливости ради, он был очень хорошим танцором. Он безвреден и безобиден, и, я искренне верю, не подозревает о подлости и дерзости мошенника, в сговоре с которым он сейчас находится. Что касается ставок, которые ежедневно рекламируются, то они, как и все его дела, – обман. Ни один доллар никогда не ставится или не используется, а якобы судьи, помогающие в этом фарсе, – просто пустобрехи. Писатель Томас Лоу Николс поддержал некоторые части этой истории в своей книге по социальной истории 1864 года. Он утверждает, что в 1841 году Даймонд оставил работу танцора у Барнума и был заменен «настоящим негром», которого Барнум назвал «чемпионом мира по танцам негров». Николс так и не назвал этого танцора Джубой, но более поздние авторы пришли к выводу, что это был он. Историк Эрик Лотт отметил иронию этой ситуации: темнокожий человек имитирует белого, имитирующего темнокожего. Начиная с начала 1840-х годов, Джуба начал серию танцевальных соревнований, известных как «поединки танцоров». Он соревновался с белым соперником Джоном Даймондом, который рекламировал себя как того, кто «изображает эфиопский характер лучше, чем любой другой белый человек». Источники расходятся во мнениях относительно даты их первого соревнования; оно могло состояться, когда Даймонд еще работал на Барнума, или через год-два. Эта реклама из New York Herald от 8 июля 1844 года типична для рекламы этих матчей:
Master Juba (ca. 1825 – ca. 1852 or 1853) was an African American dancer active in the 1840s. He was one of the first black performers in the United States to play onstage for white audiences and the only one of the era to tour with a white minstrel group. His real name was believed to be William Henry Lane, and he was also known as "Boz's Juba" following Dickens's graphic description of him in American Notes. As a teenager, he began his career in the rough saloons and dance halls of Manhattan's Five Points neighborhood, moving on to minstrel shows in the mid 1840s. "Master Juba" frequently challenged and defeated the best white dancers, including the period favorite, John Diamond. At the height of his American career, Juba's act featured a sequence in which he imitated a series of famous dancers of the day and closed by performing in his own style. Being a black man, he appeared with minstrel troupes in which he imitated white minstrel dancers caricaturing black dance, obscuring his underlying ethnic identity with blackface Even with his success in America, his greatest success came in England. In 1848 "Boz's Juba" traveled to London with the Ethiopian Serenaders, an otherwise white minstrel troupe. Boz's Juba became a sensation in Britain for his dance style. He was a critical favorite and the most written about performer of the 1848 season. Nevertheless, an element of exploitation followed him through the British Isles, with writers treating him as an exhibit on display. Records next place Juba in both Britain and America in the early 1850s. His American critics were less kind, and Juba faded from the limelight. He died in 1852 or 1853, likely from overwork and malnutrition. Scant details appear in primary sources, and secondary sources—most dating to years after his death—are of dubious validity. Dance historian Marian Hannah Winter proposed that Juba was born to free parents in 1825 or later. Showman Michael B. Leavitt wrote in 1912 that Juba came from Providence, Rhode Island, and theater historian T. Allston Brown gives his real name as William Henry Lane. According to an item in the August 11, 1895 edition of the New York Herald, Juba lived in New York's Five Points District. The Irish and black populations intermingled and borrowed elements of folk culture from each other. One area of exchange was dance, and the Irish jig blended with black folk steps. In this environment, Juba learned to dance from his peers, Winter speculated that by about age 15, Juba had no family. "Jube" and "Juba" were common names for slaves in this period, especially those rumored to have dancing or musical talent. For example, in 1840 a man named Lewis Davis was using the name "Master Juber" and making his living "travelling through the states, dancing negro extravaganzas, breakdowns, &c". He was arrested for theft in New York City. An anonymous letter from 1841 or early 1842 in the tabloid newspaper the Sunday Flash states that Juba was working for showman P. T. Barnum. The writer stated that Barnum had managed the dancer since 1840, when he had disguised the boy as a white minstrel performer—by making him up in blackface—and put him on at the New York Vauxhall Gardens. In 1841, the letter alleges, Barnum went so far as to present his charge as the Irish American performer John Diamond, the most celebrated dancer of the day. The letter further accuses Barnum of entering Juba as Diamond in rigged dance competitions against other performers:
The boy is fifteen or sixteen years of age; his name is "Juba;" and to do him justice, he is a very fair dancer. He is of harmless and inoffensive disposition, and is not, I sincerely believe, aware of the meanness and audacity of the swindler to which he is presently a party. As to the wagers which the bills daily blazon forth, they are like the rest of his business—all a cheat. Not one dollar is ever bet or staked, and the pretended judges who aid in the farce, are mere blowers. Writer Thomas Low Nichols supported parts of the story in an 1864 book of social history. He states that in 1841 Diamond quit his work as a dancer in the employ of Barnum and was replaced by "a genuine negro", whom Barnum billed as "the champion nigger dancer of the world". Nichols never identified the dancer as Juba, but later writers concluded that the boy was that performer. Historian Eric Lott has identified the irony of this arrangement: a black man imitating a white man imitating a black man. Beginning in the early 1840s, Juba began a series of dance competitions known as challenge dances. He faced white rival John Diamond, who advertised that he "delineate[d] the Ethiopian character superior to any other white person". Sources disagree about the date of their first contest; it may have occurred while Diamond was still working for Barnum or a year or two later. This advertisement from the July 8, 1844, New York Herald is typical of the publicity the matches generated:
GREAT PUBLIC CONTEST
Between the two most renowned dancers in the world, the Original JOHN DIAMOND and the colored boy JUBA, for a Wager of $200, on MONDAY EVENING July 8 at the BOWERY AMPHITHEATRE, which building has been expressly hired from the Proprietor, Mr. Smith, for this night only, as its accommodations will afford all a fair view of each step of these wonderful Dancers. The fame of these two Celebrated Breakdown Dancers has already spread over the Union, and the numerous friends of each claim the Championship for their favorite, and who have anxiously wished for a Public Trial between them and thus known which is to bear the Title of the Champion Dancer of the World. The time to decide that has come, as the friends of Juba have challenged the world to produce his superior in the art for $100. That Challenge has been accepted by the friends of Diamond, and on Monday Evening they meet and Dance three Jigs, Two Reels, and the Camptown Hornpipe. Five Judges have been selected for their ability and knowledge of the Art, so that a fair decision will be made. Rule—Each Dancer will select his own Violin and the victory will be decided by the best time and the greatest number of steps. Historian James W. Cook has suggested that Juba and Diamond may have staged their first competition as a form of mutual publicity. Claims of black superiority over an acclaimed white rival were otherwise unheard of in the climate of racial segregation and white supremacy that permeated New York City and the country at large in the mid 1840s. After the dance, they compared notes and chose the winner. Audience members and friends of the competitors bet on the outcome and could name the victor by popular acclaim in the case the judges could not come to a decision. According to an undated reference by Leavitt, Juba lost one challenge, at the Boylston Gardens in Boston, but records show that he beat Diamond in all other competitions. An undated clipping from the Harvard Theatre Collection, written by a fan of minstrelsy, describes the single dance competition that Diamond managed to win: "One of the fiddlers played a reel for him [Juba], and he shuffled, and twisted, and walked around, and danced on for one hour and fifteen minutes by the watch." Then Juba made a loud strike with his left foot as the crowd cheered and he got a drink from the bar. Diamond was next and tried to act cool but resolute. He knew that he would displease Barnum by losing and he had his race at stake: "There was another thing about this match dance that made Diamond want to win. You see it was not only a case of Barnum's Museum against Pete Williams's dance house, but it was a case of white against black. So Jack Diamond went at his dancin' with double energy—first, for his place, next, for his color." He beat Juba's time and "gave a hop, skip and a jump, a yell and a bow". A black man shouted out, "He's a white man, sure but he's got a nigger in his heel." The two had their most famous matchup in New York City in 1844, where Juba beat Diamond for $500. Juba then traveled to Boston, billing himself as the "King of All the Dancers", and played for two weeks, with competitions versus Frank Diamond (no relation to John). In 1842, English writer Charles Dickens toured New York's Five Points. This was around the time of the challenge dances, and Dickens was possibly drawn by rumors of Barnum's disguising of a black youth as a white minstrel performer. There the writer witnessed a performance by "a lively young negro" at the Almack's tavern and brothel at 67 Orange Street in the infamous Mulberry Bend. The November 11, 1842, edition of the New York Herald later identified this dancer as Juba. Dickens wrote in his American Notes,
The corpulent black fiddler, and his friend who plays the tambourine, stamp upon the boarding of the small raised orchestra in which they sit, and play a lively measure. Five or six couples come upon the floor, marshalled by a lively young negro, who is the wit of the assembly, and the greatest dancer known. He never leaves off making queer faces, and is the delight of all the rest, who grin from ear to ear incessantly
But the dance commences. Every gentleman sets as long as he likes to the opposite lady, and the opposite lady to him, and all are so long about it that the sport begins to languish, when suddenly the lively hero dashes in to the rescue. Instantly the fiddler grins, and goes at it tooth and nail; there is new energy in the tambourine; new laughter in the dancers; new smiles in the landlady; new confidence in the landlord; new brightness in the very candles. Single shuffle, double shuffle, cut and cross cut; snapping his fingers, rolling his eyes, turning in his knees, presenting the backs of his legs in front, spinning about on his toes and heels like nothing but the man's fingers on the tambourine; dancing with two left legs, two right legs, two wooden legs, two wire legs, two spring legs—all sorts of legs and no legs—what is this to him? And in what walk of life, or dance of life, does man ever get such stimulating applause as thunders about him, when, having danced his partner off her feet, and himself too, he finishes by leaping gloriously on the bar counter, and calling for something to drink, with the chuckle of a million of counterfeit Jim Crows, in one inimitable sound! Juba may have capitalized on the free publicity given him by Dickens as he made the jump from the saloon to the stage.</blockquote>
In this performance, Juba imitated the white minstrel performers Richard Pelham, Frank Brower, John Daniels, John Smith, James Sanford, Frank Diamond, and John Diamond. The idea that Juba could "imitate himself" after mimicking his rivals points up, according to Lott, "minstrelsy's fundamental consequence for black culture, the dispossession and control by whites of black forms that would not for a long time be recovered". and his fame soared. He toured through New England with the Georgia Champion Minstrels in 1844. In 1845, Juba began touring with the Ethiopian Minstrels. The troupe gave him top billing over its four white members, unprecedented for a black performer. He played a character named Ikey Vanjacklen, "the barber's boy" in a piece called "Going for the Cup, or, Old Mrs. Williams's Dance", one of the earliest known minstrel sketches. It focused on Juba's dancing in a milieu of competition and showing off. The plot follows two characters trying to fix a dance contest by soaping the floor in a way that will make all of the competitors fall except Ikey. They bet on Vanjacklen, but in the end, the judge steals the money.
ВЕЛИКОЕ ПУБЛИЧНОЕ СОРЕВНОВАНИЕ
Master Juba (ca. 1825 – ca. 1852 or 1853) was an African American dancer active in the 1840s. He was one of the first black performers in the United States to play onstage for white audiences and the only one of the era to tour with a white minstrel group. His real name was believed to be William Henry Lane, and he was also known as "Boz's Juba" following Dickens's graphic description of him in American Notes. As a teenager, he began his career in the rough saloons and dance halls of Manhattan's Five Points neighborhood, moving on to minstrel shows in the mid 1840s. "Master Juba" frequently challenged and defeated the best white dancers, including the period favorite, John Diamond. At the height of his American career, Juba's act featured a sequence in which he imitated a series of famous dancers of the day and closed by performing in his own style. Being a black man, he appeared with minstrel troupes in which he imitated white minstrel dancers caricaturing black dance, obscuring his underlying ethnic identity with blackface Even with his success in America, his greatest success came in England. In 1848 "Boz's Juba" traveled to London with the Ethiopian Serenaders, an otherwise white minstrel troupe. Boz's Juba became a sensation in Britain for his dance style. He was a critical favorite and the most written about performer of the 1848 season. Nevertheless, an element of exploitation followed him through the British Isles, with writers treating him as an exhibit on display. Records next place Juba in both Britain and America in the early 1850s. His American critics were less kind, and Juba faded from the limelight. He died in 1852 or 1853, likely from overwork and malnutrition. Scant details appear in primary sources, and secondary sources—most dating to years after his death—are of dubious validity. Dance historian Marian Hannah Winter proposed that Juba was born to free parents in 1825 or later. Showman Michael B. Leavitt wrote in 1912 that Juba came from Providence, Rhode Island, and theater historian T. Allston Brown gives his real name as William Henry Lane. According to an item in the August 11, 1895 edition of the New York Herald, Juba lived in New York's Five Points District. The Irish and black populations intermingled and borrowed elements of folk culture from each other. One area of exchange was dance, and the Irish jig blended with black folk steps. In this environment, Juba learned to dance from his peers, Winter speculated that by about age 15, Juba had no family. "Jube" and "Juba" were common names for slaves in this period, especially those rumored to have dancing or musical talent. For example, in 1840 a man named Lewis Davis was using the name "Master Juber" and making his living "travelling through the states, dancing negro extravaganzas, breakdowns, &c". He was arrested for theft in New York City. An anonymous letter from 1841 or early 1842 in the tabloid newspaper the Sunday Flash states that Juba was working for showman P. T. Barnum. The writer stated that Barnum had managed the dancer since 1840, when he had disguised the boy as a white minstrel performer—by making him up in blackface—and put him on at the New York Vauxhall Gardens. In 1841, the letter alleges, Barnum went so far as to present his charge as the Irish American performer John Diamond, the most celebrated dancer of the day. The letter further accuses Barnum of entering Juba as Diamond in rigged dance competitions against other performers:
The boy is fifteen or sixteen years of age; his name is "Juba;" and to do him justice, he is a very fair dancer. He is of harmless and inoffensive disposition, and is not, I sincerely believe, aware of the meanness and audacity of the swindler to which he is presently a party. As to the wagers which the bills daily blazon forth, they are like the rest of his business—all a cheat. Not one dollar is ever bet or staked, and the pretended judges who aid in the farce, are mere blowers. Writer Thomas Low Nichols supported parts of the story in an 1864 book of social history. He states that in 1841 Diamond quit his work as a dancer in the employ of Barnum and was replaced by "a genuine negro", whom Barnum billed as "the champion nigger dancer of the world". Nichols never identified the dancer as Juba, but later writers concluded that the boy was that performer. Historian Eric Lott has identified the irony of this arrangement: a black man imitating a white man imitating a black man. Beginning in the early 1840s, Juba began a series of dance competitions known as challenge dances. He faced white rival John Diamond, who advertised that he "delineate[d] the Ethiopian character superior to any other white person". Sources disagree about the date of their first contest; it may have occurred while Diamond was still working for Barnum or a year or two later. This advertisement from the July 8, 1844, New York Herald is typical of the publicity the matches generated:
GREAT PUBLIC CONTEST
Between the two most renowned dancers in the world, the Original JOHN DIAMOND and the colored boy JUBA, for a Wager of $200, on MONDAY EVENING July 8 at the BOWERY AMPHITHEATRE, which building has been expressly hired from the Proprietor, Mr. Smith, for this night only, as its accommodations will afford all a fair view of each step of these wonderful Dancers. The fame of these two Celebrated Breakdown Dancers has already spread over the Union, and the numerous friends of each claim the Championship for their favorite, and who have anxiously wished for a Public Trial between them and thus known which is to bear the Title of the Champion Dancer of the World. The time to decide that has come, as the friends of Juba have challenged the world to produce his superior in the art for $100. That Challenge has been accepted by the friends of Diamond, and on Monday Evening they meet and Dance three Jigs, Two Reels, and the Camptown Hornpipe. Five Judges have been selected for their ability and knowledge of the Art, so that a fair decision will be made. Rule—Each Dancer will select his own Violin and the victory will be decided by the best time and the greatest number of steps. Historian James W. Cook has suggested that Juba and Diamond may have staged their first competition as a form of mutual publicity. Claims of black superiority over an acclaimed white rival were otherwise unheard of in the climate of racial segregation and white supremacy that permeated New York City and the country at large in the mid 1840s. After the dance, they compared notes and chose the winner. Audience members and friends of the competitors bet on the outcome and could name the victor by popular acclaim in the case the judges could not come to a decision. According to an undated reference by Leavitt, Juba lost one challenge, at the Boylston Gardens in Boston, but records show that he beat Diamond in all other competitions. An undated clipping from the Harvard Theatre Collection, written by a fan of minstrelsy, describes the single dance competition that Diamond managed to win: "One of the fiddlers played a reel for him [Juba], and he shuffled, and twisted, and walked around, and danced on for one hour and fifteen minutes by the watch." Then Juba made a loud strike with his left foot as the crowd cheered and he got a drink from the bar. Diamond was next and tried to act cool but resolute. He knew that he would displease Barnum by losing and he had his race at stake: "There was another thing about this match dance that made Diamond want to win. You see it was not only a case of Barnum's Museum against Pete Williams's dance house, but it was a case of white against black. So Jack Diamond went at his dancin' with double energy—first, for his place, next, for his color." He beat Juba's time and "gave a hop, skip and a jump, a yell and a bow". A black man shouted out, "He's a white man, sure but he's got a nigger in his heel." The two had their most famous matchup in New York City in 1844, where Juba beat Diamond for $500. Juba then traveled to Boston, billing himself as the "King of All the Dancers", and played for two weeks, with competitions versus Frank Diamond (no relation to John). In 1842, English writer Charles Dickens toured New York's Five Points. This was around the time of the challenge dances, and Dickens was possibly drawn by rumors of Barnum's disguising of a black youth as a white minstrel performer. There the writer witnessed a performance by "a lively young negro" at the Almack's tavern and brothel at 67 Orange Street in the infamous Mulberry Bend. The November 11, 1842, edition of the New York Herald later identified this dancer as Juba. Dickens wrote in his American Notes,
The corpulent black fiddler, and his friend who plays the tambourine, stamp upon the boarding of the small raised orchestra in which they sit, and play a lively measure. Five or six couples come upon the floor, marshalled by a lively young negro, who is the wit of the assembly, and the greatest dancer known. He never leaves off making queer faces, and is the delight of all the rest, who grin from ear to ear incessantly
But the dance commences. Every gentleman sets as long as he likes to the opposite lady, and the opposite lady to him, and all are so long about it that the sport begins to languish, when suddenly the lively hero dashes in to the rescue. Instantly the fiddler grins, and goes at it tooth and nail; there is new energy in the tambourine; new laughter in the dancers; new smiles in the landlady; new confidence in the landlord; new brightness in the very candles. Single shuffle, double shuffle, cut and cross cut; snapping his fingers, rolling his eyes, turning in his knees, presenting the backs of his legs in front, spinning about on his toes and heels like nothing but the man's fingers on the tambourine; dancing with two left legs, two right legs, two wooden legs, two wire legs, two spring legs—all sorts of legs and no legs—what is this to him? And in what walk of life, or dance of life, does man ever get such stimulating applause as thunders about him, when, having danced his partner off her feet, and himself too, he finishes by leaping gloriously on the bar counter, and calling for something to drink, with the chuckle of a million of counterfeit Jim Crows, in one inimitable sound! Juba may have capitalized on the free publicity given him by Dickens as he made the jump from the saloon to the stage.</blockquote>
In this performance, Juba imitated the white minstrel performers Richard Pelham, Frank Brower, John Daniels, John Smith, James Sanford, Frank Diamond, and John Diamond. The idea that Juba could "imitate himself" after mimicking his rivals points up, according to Lott, "minstrelsy's fundamental consequence for black culture, the dispossession and control by whites of black forms that would not for a long time be recovered". and his fame soared. He toured through New England with the Georgia Champion Minstrels in 1844. In 1845, Juba began touring with the Ethiopian Minstrels. The troupe gave him top billing over its four white members, unprecedented for a black performer. He played a character named Ikey Vanjacklen, "the barber's boy" in a piece called "Going for the Cup, or, Old Mrs. Williams's Dance", one of the earliest known minstrel sketches. It focused on Juba's dancing in a milieu of competition and showing off. The plot follows two characters trying to fix a dance contest by soaping the floor in a way that will make all of the competitors fall except Ikey. They bet on Vanjacklen, but in the end, the judge steals the money.
Между двумя самыми известными танцорами в мире, оригинальным ДЖОНОМ ДАЙМОНДОМ и темнокожим мальчиком ДЖУБОЙ, на пари в 200 долларов, в ПОНЕДЕЛЬНИК ВЕЧЕРОМ 8 июля в АМФИТЕАТРЕ БОУЭРИ, здание которого было специально арендовано у владельца, г-на Смита, только на эту ночь, поскольку его вместимость позволит всем хорошо видеть каждый шаг этих удивительных танцоров. Слава этих двух знаменитых танцоров брейкдауна уже распространилась по всему Союзу, и многочисленные друзья каждого из них претендуют на звание чемпиона, и они с нетерпением ждали публичного испытания между ними, чтобы узнать, кто будет носить титул чемпиона мира по танцам. Время для этого наступило, поскольку друзья Джубы бросили вызов миру, чтобы представить его превосходящего в этом искусстве за 100 долларов. Этот вызов был принят друзьями Даймонда, и в понедельник вечером они встретятся и исполнят три джиги, два рила и хорпоп Camptown. Было отобрано пять судей, известных своими способностями и знаниями в этом искусстве, чтобы обеспечить справедливое решение. Правило: каждый танцор выбирает свою скрипку, и победа будет определяться лучшим темпом и наибольшим количеством шагов. Историк Джеймс В. Кук предположил, что Джуба и Даймонд могли организовать свое первое соревнование как форму взаимной рекламы. Заявления о превосходстве темнокожего над известным белым соперником были неслыханны в атмосфере расовой сегрегации и превосходства белых, которая пронизывала Нью-Йорк и всю страну в середине 1840-х годов. После танца они обменивались мнениями и выбирали победителя. Зрители и друзья соперников делали ставки на исход и могли назвать победителя по общему признанию, если судьи не могли прийти к соглашению. Согласно неопубликованной справке Ливитта, Джуба проиграл один поединок в Бойлстон-Гарденс в Бостоне, но записи показывают, что он победил Даймонда во всех остальных соревнованиях. В неопубликованном отрывке из коллекции Гарвардского театра, написанном поклонником минстрель-шоу, описывается единственный танцевальный конкурс, который Даймонду удалось выиграть: «Один из скрипачей сыграл рил для него [Джубы], и он переступал с ноги на ногу, крутился, ходил вокруг и танцевал в течение часа и пятнадцати минут по часам». Затем Джуба громко ударил левой ногой, когда толпа ликовала, и выпил из бара. Даймонд был следующим и попытался выглядеть круто, но решительно. Он знал, что разозлит Барнума, если проиграет, и на кону стояло его будущее: «В этом поединке было еще кое-что, что заставило Даймонда захотеть победить. Видите ли, дело было не только в музее Барнума против танцевального дома Пита Уильямса, но и в противостоянии белого и черного. Поэтому Джек Даймонд приступил к танцам с удвоенной энергией – во-первых, ради своего места, а во-вторых, ради своего цвета». Он превзошел время Джубы и «подпрыгнул, подскочил и поклонился». Чернокожий выкрикнул: «Он белый, конечно, но у него есть негр в пятке».
Master Juba (ca. 1825 – ca. 1852 or 1853) was an African American dancer active in the 1840s. He was one of the first black performers in the United States to play onstage for white audiences and the only one of the era to tour with a white minstrel group. His real name was believed to be William Henry Lane, and he was also known as "Boz's Juba" following Dickens's graphic description of him in American Notes. As a teenager, he began his career in the rough saloons and dance halls of Manhattan's Five Points neighborhood, moving on to minstrel shows in the mid 1840s. "Master Juba" frequently challenged and defeated the best white dancers, including the period favorite, John Diamond. At the height of his American career, Juba's act featured a sequence in which he imitated a series of famous dancers of the day and closed by performing in his own style. Being a black man, he appeared with minstrel troupes in which he imitated white minstrel dancers caricaturing black dance, obscuring his underlying ethnic identity with blackface Even with his success in America, his greatest success came in England. In 1848 "Boz's Juba" traveled to London with the Ethiopian Serenaders, an otherwise white minstrel troupe. Boz's Juba became a sensation in Britain for his dance style. He was a critical favorite and the most written about performer of the 1848 season. Nevertheless, an element of exploitation followed him through the British Isles, with writers treating him as an exhibit on display. Records next place Juba in both Britain and America in the early 1850s. His American critics were less kind, and Juba faded from the limelight. He died in 1852 or 1853, likely from overwork and malnutrition. Scant details appear in primary sources, and secondary sources—most dating to years after his death—are of dubious validity. Dance historian Marian Hannah Winter proposed that Juba was born to free parents in 1825 or later. Showman Michael B. Leavitt wrote in 1912 that Juba came from Providence, Rhode Island, and theater historian T. Allston Brown gives his real name as William Henry Lane. According to an item in the August 11, 1895 edition of the New York Herald, Juba lived in New York's Five Points District. The Irish and black populations intermingled and borrowed elements of folk culture from each other. One area of exchange was dance, and the Irish jig blended with black folk steps. In this environment, Juba learned to dance from his peers, Winter speculated that by about age 15, Juba had no family. "Jube" and "Juba" were common names for slaves in this period, especially those rumored to have dancing or musical talent. For example, in 1840 a man named Lewis Davis was using the name "Master Juber" and making his living "travelling through the states, dancing negro extravaganzas, breakdowns, &c". He was arrested for theft in New York City. An anonymous letter from 1841 or early 1842 in the tabloid newspaper the Sunday Flash states that Juba was working for showman P. T. Barnum. The writer stated that Barnum had managed the dancer since 1840, when he had disguised the boy as a white minstrel performer—by making him up in blackface—and put him on at the New York Vauxhall Gardens. In 1841, the letter alleges, Barnum went so far as to present his charge as the Irish American performer John Diamond, the most celebrated dancer of the day. The letter further accuses Barnum of entering Juba as Diamond in rigged dance competitions against other performers:
The boy is fifteen or sixteen years of age; his name is "Juba;" and to do him justice, he is a very fair dancer. He is of harmless and inoffensive disposition, and is not, I sincerely believe, aware of the meanness and audacity of the swindler to which he is presently a party. As to the wagers which the bills daily blazon forth, they are like the rest of his business—all a cheat. Not one dollar is ever bet or staked, and the pretended judges who aid in the farce, are mere blowers. Writer Thomas Low Nichols supported parts of the story in an 1864 book of social history. He states that in 1841 Diamond quit his work as a dancer in the employ of Barnum and was replaced by "a genuine negro", whom Barnum billed as "the champion nigger dancer of the world". Nichols never identified the dancer as Juba, but later writers concluded that the boy was that performer. Historian Eric Lott has identified the irony of this arrangement: a black man imitating a white man imitating a black man. Beginning in the early 1840s, Juba began a series of dance competitions known as challenge dances. He faced white rival John Diamond, who advertised that he "delineate[d] the Ethiopian character superior to any other white person". Sources disagree about the date of their first contest; it may have occurred while Diamond was still working for Barnum or a year or two later. This advertisement from the July 8, 1844, New York Herald is typical of the publicity the matches generated:
GREAT PUBLIC CONTEST
Between the two most renowned dancers in the world, the Original JOHN DIAMOND and the colored boy JUBA, for a Wager of $200, on MONDAY EVENING July 8 at the BOWERY AMPHITHEATRE, which building has been expressly hired from the Proprietor, Mr. Smith, for this night only, as its accommodations will afford all a fair view of each step of these wonderful Dancers. The fame of these two Celebrated Breakdown Dancers has already spread over the Union, and the numerous friends of each claim the Championship for their favorite, and who have anxiously wished for a Public Trial between them and thus known which is to bear the Title of the Champion Dancer of the World. The time to decide that has come, as the friends of Juba have challenged the world to produce his superior in the art for $100. That Challenge has been accepted by the friends of Diamond, and on Monday Evening they meet and Dance three Jigs, Two Reels, and the Camptown Hornpipe. Five Judges have been selected for their ability and knowledge of the Art, so that a fair decision will be made. Rule—Each Dancer will select his own Violin and the victory will be decided by the best time and the greatest number of steps. Historian James W. Cook has suggested that Juba and Diamond may have staged their first competition as a form of mutual publicity. Claims of black superiority over an acclaimed white rival were otherwise unheard of in the climate of racial segregation and white supremacy that permeated New York City and the country at large in the mid 1840s. After the dance, they compared notes and chose the winner. Audience members and friends of the competitors bet on the outcome and could name the victor by popular acclaim in the case the judges could not come to a decision. According to an undated reference by Leavitt, Juba lost one challenge, at the Boylston Gardens in Boston, but records show that he beat Diamond in all other competitions. An undated clipping from the Harvard Theatre Collection, written by a fan of minstrelsy, describes the single dance competition that Diamond managed to win: "One of the fiddlers played a reel for him [Juba], and he shuffled, and twisted, and walked around, and danced on for one hour and fifteen minutes by the watch." Then Juba made a loud strike with his left foot as the crowd cheered and he got a drink from the bar. Diamond was next and tried to act cool but resolute. He knew that he would displease Barnum by losing and he had his race at stake: "There was another thing about this match dance that made Diamond want to win. You see it was not only a case of Barnum's Museum against Pete Williams's dance house, but it was a case of white against black. So Jack Diamond went at his dancin' with double energy—first, for his place, next, for his color." He beat Juba's time and "gave a hop, skip and a jump, a yell and a bow". A black man shouted out, "He's a white man, sure but he's got a nigger in his heel." The two had their most famous matchup in New York City in 1844, where Juba beat Diamond for $500. Juba then traveled to Boston, billing himself as the "King of All the Dancers", and played for two weeks, with competitions versus Frank Diamond (no relation to John). In 1842, English writer Charles Dickens toured New York's Five Points. This was around the time of the challenge dances, and Dickens was possibly drawn by rumors of Barnum's disguising of a black youth as a white minstrel performer. There the writer witnessed a performance by "a lively young negro" at the Almack's tavern and brothel at 67 Orange Street in the infamous Mulberry Bend. The November 11, 1842, edition of the New York Herald later identified this dancer as Juba. Dickens wrote in his American Notes,
The corpulent black fiddler, and his friend who plays the tambourine, stamp upon the boarding of the small raised orchestra in which they sit, and play a lively measure. Five or six couples come upon the floor, marshalled by a lively young negro, who is the wit of the assembly, and the greatest dancer known. He never leaves off making queer faces, and is the delight of all the rest, who grin from ear to ear incessantly
But the dance commences. Every gentleman sets as long as he likes to the opposite lady, and the opposite lady to him, and all are so long about it that the sport begins to languish, when suddenly the lively hero dashes in to the rescue. Instantly the fiddler grins, and goes at it tooth and nail; there is new energy in the tambourine; new laughter in the dancers; new smiles in the landlady; new confidence in the landlord; new brightness in the very candles. Single shuffle, double shuffle, cut and cross cut; snapping his fingers, rolling his eyes, turning in his knees, presenting the backs of his legs in front, spinning about on his toes and heels like nothing but the man's fingers on the tambourine; dancing with two left legs, two right legs, two wooden legs, two wire legs, two spring legs—all sorts of legs and no legs—what is this to him? And in what walk of life, or dance of life, does man ever get such stimulating applause as thunders about him, when, having danced his partner off her feet, and himself too, he finishes by leaping gloriously on the bar counter, and calling for something to drink, with the chuckle of a million of counterfeit Jim Crows, in one inimitable sound! Juba may have capitalized on the free publicity given him by Dickens as he made the jump from the saloon to the stage.</blockquote>
In this performance, Juba imitated the white minstrel performers Richard Pelham, Frank Brower, John Daniels, John Smith, James Sanford, Frank Diamond, and John Diamond. The idea that Juba could "imitate himself" after mimicking his rivals points up, according to Lott, "minstrelsy's fundamental consequence for black culture, the dispossession and control by whites of black forms that would not for a long time be recovered". and his fame soared. He toured through New England with the Georgia Champion Minstrels in 1844. In 1845, Juba began touring with the Ethiopian Minstrels. The troupe gave him top billing over its four white members, unprecedented for a black performer. He played a character named Ikey Vanjacklen, "the barber's boy" in a piece called "Going for the Cup, or, Old Mrs. Williams's Dance", one of the earliest known minstrel sketches. It focused on Juba's dancing in a milieu of competition and showing off. The plot follows two characters trying to fix a dance contest by soaping the floor in a way that will make all of the competitors fall except Ikey. They bet on Vanjacklen, but in the end, the judge steals the money.
Поздние годы жизни и смерть, 1850-1854
Вернувшись в Соединенные Штаты, Джуба выступал сольно в музыкальных залах для рабочего класса, концертных салонах и антрактах в непримечательных театрах Нью-Йорка: он прошел путь от безвестности к славе и снова вернулся в забвение. Сообщается, что исполнитель по имени Джамбо умер через две недели в Дублине. Махар указывает дату 1853 года. Ему было около двадцати с лишним лет. В январе 1854 года английская газета Northern Daily Times опубликовала рекламу представления в Королевском театре «Колизей» на улице Парадайс-стрит в Ливерпуле, в котором участвовал «знаменитый Джуба Боза, увековеченный Чарльзом Диккенсом в его заметках об Америке». В 1854 году в Ливерпуле вспыхнула эпидемия холеры, вызвавшая высокую смертность. 3 февраля 1854 года в городе была зарегистрирована смерть человека по имени «Боис Джуба», и Оксфордский словарь национальной биографии считает «Боис Джуба» вероятной опечаткой вместо «Джубы Боза» – прозвища, под которым Джуба был наиболее известен в Англии. В словаре отмечается, что другие биографические данные, указанные в свидетельстве о смерти – умерший был американским музыкантом, 30 лет от роду – соответствуют информации о Джубе. «Боис Джуба» был зарегистрирован как умерший в инфекционном отделении больницы Браунлоу-Хилл в Ливерпуле и был похоронен 6 февраля 1854 года в бесплатной части кладбища близлежащей церкви Святого Мартина. Винтер считал его «почти сверхчеловеческий график» и «истощение сил и здоровья» основными причинами. Если предположить, что все Джубы – это один и тот же человек, то записи свидетельствуют о том, что Джуба работал день и ночь в течение 11 лет – с 1839 по 1850 год. Особенно в начале карьеры Джуба работал за еду, ему подавали типичную для того времени тавернскую еду – жареного угря и эль. Такой изнурительный график, в сочетании с плохим питанием и недостатком сна, вероятно, предопределил раннюю смерть Джубы. Другой автор описывал «серию шагов, которые совершенно невозможно описать из-за их количества, необычности и скорости исполнения». Тем не менее, подобные сравнения нельзя считать достоверным отражением личного стиля Джубы. Как исполнитель в гриме, а значит, пародист, Джуба мог сознательно включать в свои номера пародийные элементы на подобные танцы. Чарльз Диккенс писал о молодом чернокожем танцовщике в Нью-Йорке, что «он никогда не перестает корчить рожи». Зритель лондонской публики, видевший Джубу в Vauxhall Gardens, удивлялся: «Как он мог так завязывать ноги в узлы и бросать их так безрассудно, или заставлять его ноги мелькать так быстро, что они исчезали из виду в его энергии?» Журнал The Mirror and United Kingdom Magazine писал: «Такая подвижность мышц, такая гибкость суставов, такие прыжки, такие скольжения, такие вращения, такая работа пальцами и пятками, такие движения назад и вперед, такие позы, такая уверенность на ногах, такая эластичность сухожилий, такая смена движений, такая энергия, такое разнообразие, такая естественная грация, такая выносливость, такая сила». Manchester Examiner передал нечто от ритма выступления Джубы:
Nevertheless, such comparisons cannot be taken as true indications of Juba's personal style. As a blackface minstrel, and thus parodist, Juba may have incorporated conscious parodies of such dances into his act. Charles Dickens wrote of the young black dancer in New York that "[h]e never leaves off making queer faces". A London audience member who saw Juba at the Vauxhall Gardens wondered, "How could he tie his legs into such knots, and fling them about so recklessly, or make his feet twinkle until you lose sight of them altogether in his energy." The Mirror and United Kingdom Magazine declared, "Such mobility of muscles, such flexibility of joints, such boundings, such slidings, such gyrations, such toes and such heelings, such backwardings and forwardings, such posturings, such firmness of foot, such elasticity of tendon, such mutation of movement, such vigour, such variety, such natural grace, such powers of endurance, such potency of pastern." The Manchester Examiner captured something of the rhythm of Juba's performance:
Surely he cannot be flesh and blood, but some more subtle substance, or how could he turn, and twine, and twist, and twirl, and hop, and jump, and kick, and throw his feet almost with a velocity that makes one think they are playing hide and seek with a flash of lightning! Heels or toes, on feet or on knees, on the ground or off, it is all the same to Juba; his limbs move as if they were stuffed with electric wires
Неужели он не плоть и кровь, а некое более тонкое вещество? Иначе как он мог так поворачиваться, переплетаться, извиваться, кружиться, прыгать, скакать, пинаться и бросать ноги с такой скоростью, что кажется, будто они играют в прятки с молнией! На пятках или пальцах, на ногах или на коленях, на земле или в воздухе – для Джубы все едино; его конечности двигаются, словно они набиты электрическими проводами.
Nevertheless, such comparisons cannot be taken as true indications of Juba's personal style. As a blackface minstrel, and thus parodist, Juba may have incorporated conscious parodies of such dances into his act. Charles Dickens wrote of the young black dancer in New York that "[h]e never leaves off making queer faces". A London audience member who saw Juba at the Vauxhall Gardens wondered, "How could he tie his legs into such knots, and fling them about so recklessly, or make his feet twinkle until you lose sight of them altogether in his energy." The Mirror and United Kingdom Magazine declared, "Such mobility of muscles, such flexibility of joints, such boundings, such slidings, such gyrations, such toes and such heelings, such backwardings and forwardings, such posturings, such firmness of foot, such elasticity of tendon, such mutation of movement, such vigour, such variety, such natural grace, such powers of endurance, such potency of pastern." The Manchester Examiner captured something of the rhythm of Juba's performance:
Surely he cannot be flesh and blood, but some more subtle substance, or how could he turn, and twine, and twist, and twirl, and hop, and jump, and kick, and throw his feet almost with a velocity that makes one think they are playing hide and seek with a flash of lightning! Heels or toes, on feet or on knees, on the ground or off, it is all the same to Juba; his limbs move as if they were stuffed with electric wires
Ударные инструменты
Ударные звуки, которые Джуба издавал во время выступлений, были еще одним элементом, отличавшим его танец от стандартных ирландских джигов. Современные рецензенты часто упоминали эти звуки. Один критик из Ливерпуля сравнил его шаги со звуком игры на костях Пелла и на банджо Бриггса. В описаниях также встречаются элементы джива в его танце. Джуба сопровождал свои танцы быстрым, искрометным смехом, синхронизированным с темпом танца. Анонимный лондонский критик писал:
«Никогда не было смеха, подобного смеху Джубы – в нем заключен смех пятидесяти комических пантомим; он не имеет ничего общего с обычным смехом, и тем более с известным конским хохотом; это не просто смех, а отдельный, самостоятельный смех – ясный, звонкий, эхом разносящийся, резонирующий, гармоничный, полный радости и бурного веселья и искреннего задора; его можно услышать как непрерывный гул природы, пронизывающий все вокруг; он проникает в сердце, и вы начинаете смеяться в ответ, он просачивается в ухо и не отпускает, и все последующие звуки словно наполняются этим заразительным хохотом. Ну, хотя смех Джубы и чудесен, что же тогда сказать о его танце?»
Подлинность
Танцы Джубы, безусловно, включали элементы подлинной афроамериканской культуры, но степень этого влияния остаётся неясной. Элементы стиля Джубы составляют часть эстетики афроамериканского танца: перкуссия, переменный размер, использование тела как инструмента, изменения тона и темпа, экспрессивные жесты и позы. Джуба, возможно, воплощал в себе характерную для Африки эстетику – сдержанность и энергию. Историки полагают, что британским критикам было сложно описать стиль Джубы из-за его использования африканских форм, незнакомых британской буржуазии. Белые описания его выступлений перекликаются с аналогичными описаниями танцев рабов из Карибского бассейна и Соединенных Штатов. Один лондонский наблюдатель, побывавший в 1840-х годах на плантации в Южной Каролине и видевший танцы рабов, назвал их «жалким подобием по сравнению с вдохновенными движениями ног Джубы». Танец Джубы мог быть результатом смешения африканских и европейских традиций. В очерке Диккенса о нью-йоркском танцоре, где описываются лишь движения ног, упоминается ирландский джиг, но также говорится о том, что Джуба исполнял одиночный и двойной шёффл – шаги, имеющие афроамериканское происхождение.
Наследие и историография
Термины «жуба-танцор» и «жуба-танцы» стали общеупотребимыми в варьете после того, как их популяризировал мастер Джуба. Актеры, минстрели и британские клоуны, вдохновленные Джубой и другими минстрелями, использовали грим «блэкфейс» и исполняли танцы, подобные танцам Джубы, в образе сценического персонажа под названием «Веселый негрёнок». Этот персонаж распространился во Франции (с 1860 года) и Бельгии (с 1865 года) во время гастролей британских цирков. Элементы этих танцев встречались у британских клоунов с белым лицом вплоть до 1940-х годов. Восторженный прием, оказанный Джубе в Манчестере, возможно, предвещал будущий статус этого города как центра танца в Соединенном Королевстве. К несчастью, Джуба укрепил расистский карикатурный образ чернокожих как людей, от природы музыкальных, в глазах белой аудитории. Имя Джубы вошло в историю танца, но сам он долгое время оставался в забвении. Уильям Генри Лейн считается одним из пионеров развлекательной программы в жанре «минстрел-шоу». Он умер в 1854 году в работном доме в Ливерпуле от лихорадки. Более 90 лет после его смерти Джуба был в значительной степени забыт танцорами и историками, появляясь лишь в кратких упоминаниях в трудах, посвященных истории «минстрел-шоу». Стивен Джонсон предположил, что это может указывать либо на сознательное принижение значения Джубы белыми артистами и историками, либо на то, что Джуба просто не оказал столь значительного влияния. В 1947 году историк танца и популярной культуры Мариан Ханна Винтер начала возрождение репутации Джубы со своей статьей «Джуба и американское минстрельство». По мнению Винтер, Джуба преодолел препятствия расы и класса, чтобы добиться успеха в качестве профессионального танцора. Винтер впервые написала о Джубе как о человеке, который ввел элементы африканского танца в западный лексикон и тем самым способствовал созданию самобытной американской танцевальной идиомы. Таким образом, по мнению Винтер, Джуба вернул афроамериканцам элементы, украденные в расистской культуре Америки XIX века, и в процессе изобрел степ. Винтер писала, что «репертуар любого современного степ-танцора содержит элементы, которые были заложены им в театральном плане». Музыкальный историк Эйлин Сазерн называет его «главным профессиональным чернокожим минстрелем довоенного периода (и) связующим звеном между белым миром и подлинным африканским источником». Ученые считают Джубу первым афроамериканцем, который привнес аспекты подлинной черной культуры в американский танец и театр. Благодаря этому Джуба обеспечил, чтобы танец в гриме «блэкфейс» был более аутентично африканским, чем другие элементы «минстрел-шоу». Уоллес даже назвал Джубу «отцом истории мужского черного танца и «инициатором и определяющим самой формы», формы, которая наглядно выражает сложную диалектику черной мужской идентичности». Однако Джонсон предостерегает от такой интерпретации. Его анализ первоисточников обнаруживает в танце Джубы больше эксцентричности, чем предвестника степа или джаза.