Swan Lake is one of the most famous ballets of all time. When people think of ballet, this is the ballet they subconsciously picture; the pristine white tutus and graceful, flighty movements have imbedded it in the public conscious as the ultimate ballet. However, few people actually know what the story is about. I’m here to remedy that.

The story of Swan Lake starts off at a party. The nature of this party isn’t exactly explained, but it’s generally agreed that the party is for the Prince, Siegfried. His mother, the Queen, is demanding that he choose a wife, but he doesn’t want to marry any of the women she keeps throwing at him; he’d rather marry for love. He eventually becomes angry and leaves, setting off into the woods to hunt.

While out in the woods, he stumbles across the titular lake. Here lives a beautiful princess named Odette. She was kidnapped and placed under a curse by an evil sorcerer called von Rothbart (who sometimes appears as an owl or a vulture), so that while she spends her nights as a woman, she must spend her days as a swan, along with her small hoard of swan-women. When Odette and Siegfried meet, they immediately fall in love, but as they are professing their love for each other in order to break the curse, von Rothbart appears and manages to send Siegfried away. Before he goes, Odette warns Siegfried that if von Rothbart dies, the curse will never be broken.

The second half of the ballet opens onto a ball that the Queen is holding for Siegfried. Siegfried is frustrated, because his mother is demanding he announce his intentions to marry one of the women in attendance at the ball that very night, which he doesn’t want to do. During this ball, von Rothbart appears in disguise with his daughter, Odile. Odile looks almost exactly like Odette, except for the fact that she wears black instead of white. Von Rothbart and Odile manage to trick Siegfried into proclaiming that he is going to marry Odile, and he realizes his mistake only a moment later. Horrified and ashamed, he flees to find Odette. He apologizes profusely because he can no longer break her curse. Then, von Rothbart appears.

Now, there are actually two endings for Swan Lake- the “happy” ending and the “tragic” ending. The former has Siegfried and von Rothbart fight, after which Siegfried tears off von Rothbart’s wing and the curse is broken. The tragic version has Siegfried and Odette struggle to break the curse, then, once they realize that they can’t, they drown themselves in the lake.

The company I’m in is doing Swan Lake this spring, and one of the main things we were concerned about was the ending. Our director has chosen to go with the tragic ending, but has modified it a bit because, “Siegfried is such a jerk, and he never redeems himself.” We haven’t quite finished that scene yet, but we so far have Siegfried and von Rothbart fighting and mortally wounding each other, and Odette has pitched herself off a cliff. I’m a little worried about how all of the little children in the audience will react, but I really like this ending- it makes sense within the context of the ballet and the characters, and it also is emotionally powerful. It really is so much more than the pretty white tutus.