The great French novelist Celine had a fascination with ballet that spanned his entire literary career. One of these pieces, The Birth of the Fairy, dates from 1932, the year of his major novel Voyage au bout de la nuit. His wife, who also a dancer, claimed that at the time of his death he was writing a book on dance. The five dances of this volume were written with the intention of performance, and Celine traveled to Leningrad in hopes of arousing interest at the Theater Marinski. This edition, first published by Gallimard in 1959 and recognized throughout Europe as a major work, has never been translated into English before.