Since you left the terrestrial stage for a world that I know nothing about, but in which you have surely found a place in keeping with your aura, every day I have felt the need to express my gratitude for the privilege that you gave me of sharing thirty years of your life, which flew by like an unreal and fleeting moment. Beyond the intense emotions occasioned by your art and its influence in the world, I appreciated above all the diversity of your personality: your sensitive and generous soul in both private and public life, and the nobility of your heart that stood above human pettiness. Not long before your last departure, I will never forget the words you uttered with such gentleness and courage: ‘I am not afraid of dying I have never speculated I have only loved’. Very dear Serge, whether in light or in shadow, you were always a great master

A great name in the dance world and a great master for those who had the privilege of navigating through their art under his benevolent guidance… An inspired choreographer and a consummate artist. A performer who was transfigured by the figures that he personified. When he played Napoleon, he was Napoleon. When he played a pharaoh, he was a pharaoh, and in Icarus he burned his wings in the sun and symbolically died on the earth, consumed by the ambition to exceed human potential… In this connection, we could speak of his mystical side, which might go unnoticed by those who knew him only superficially, for in these moments of transfiguration, he was overwhelmed by the fact of having another, impalpable inner life. At such times he lived inwardly, detached from the world. During a tour in Egypt, we were both inside a pyramid and contemplating the room that had contained the sarcophagus of a pharaoh. Since Lifar was not saying anything, apparently lost in the mystery of the place, I broke the silence and said: “Your place is here, master”. He looked at me and replied: “”Do you think so, Labis, do you think so?” At that moment, he was the pharaoh. We see a person according to our own criteria and memories. Personally, I have the memory of a charming, kind and good-natured person, sometimes touchingly so. He had a poetic way of talking about the dance, like the feel of the tip of a dancer’s toe on the ground. We talk of classical ballet, a universal art… he attached a great deal of importance to the rise of this French invention called classical ballet, which he emphatically sublimated. One day, he told me that the “Italians and Russians have interesting temperaments for the dance [he meant the...

“His good humour, his enthusiasm, his patience, his amazing presence and his magnetism caused us to give him our best, the clock no longer mattered. We breathed an atmosphere of constant creativity. All this contributed greatly to my preserving an engaging and highly respectful memory of him. The Master remains the great choreographer, the author of a glorious period for the French dance”.

Bravo, I applaud you with all my heart, so happy for your success. Everything that you have done is so sincere, so real, so moving, and so new! I wait very impatiently to see your naked King