Danza del tragico. "Night Journey di Martha Graham"

Any tragic rewriting of the past century stands on a dual and inseparable background: that of the images and texts that have been accumulated over time to weave our tradition and what sustains and nourishes this surface, i.e. the creative power inherent in the continued process of building semantic worlds congealed in the forms of mythic thought. It is from this dual and unique perspective that drives this reading of Night Journey, the 1947 masterpiece of the founder of modern dance, Martha Graham. Through an analysis of the choreography we will try to show how this work cannot be reduced to a simple choreic transposition of the tragedy of Oedipus, but it must be interpreted in terms of an original form and experience of the tragic content in the myth itself. More specifically, we will attempt to underline how the Night Journey may represent a paradigmatic example of exhibition and actualization of a particular structure: a spiral rhythm of opposing forces.