"I am not the first straight dancer, nor the last." "There comes a moment in a young artist's life when he knows he has to bring something to the stage from within himself. He has to put in something in order to be able to take something out." "I do not try to dance better than anyone else. I only try to to dance better than myself." "The essence of all art is to have pleasure in giving pleasure." [on the late Fred Astaire] "No dancer can watch him and not know that all the rest of us should be in a different business. Astaire is remote. It's as if he were in an incubator, breathing his own air. His perfection is like crystal: you can see through it. It's hopeless to try and imitate him." "No one is born a dancer. You have to want it more than anything." "No matter what I try to do or explore, my Kirov training, my expertise, and my background call me to return to dancing after all, because that's my real vocation, and I have to serve it." "Dancers are made, not born." "I think I got disappointed over the years about New York, about the States. You know, sometimes you go and visit Europe and see good old socialism in its good part! You see public concern about art, and young people's participation and young faces in the audience. Then you arrive in the States and it is $150 to go to an opera. Ridiculous. We have so much young talent on the streets, but because everything is commercial they finally drift away from their dream of their life." - The Daily Telegraph, 09/02/2004 "That somebody has the vision to put a few steps together and make a dance out of it, there is already a certain power implanted. My job is much easier - it's just to put a light in it." - The Daily Telegraph, 09/02/2004