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<small>Alina Cojocaru</small>
Tiny steps and giant strides Interview: Alina Cojocaru may be one of the Royal Ballet's smallest members but she is also the next big thing. Debra Craine meets the rising star for The Times.
YOU NEVER KNOW where it’s going to come from. That sudden explosion of talent, that spark that lights up an art form. In the case of British ballet, it came from Ceausescu’s Romania, one of the grimmest spots in the Eastern bloc. On the day in December 1989 when Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu were put up against the wall and shot, an eight-year-old girl was outside Bucharest in a gymnastics training camp. Less than 12 years later, that girl was the toast of Covent Garden, freshly promoted to a principal with the Royal Ballet at the tender age of 19.
Alina Cojocaru’s life has been remarkable. From Bucharest to Kiev, where she trained at the state ballet school; then seesawing between Kiev and London until finally, in 1999, arriving in the corps de ballet at Covent Garden.
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