Fame's Return

Some 13 years ago a much-bundled lady lay in her deck-chair on an eastbound Atlantic liner and moaned the fate that had let her go to the U. S. and fail in a few miserably managed recitals. The lady, although it could not have been guessed by her thin, unshaped legs, was a dancer. The name she went by was La Argentina* and in Madrid she had long been a favorite. But the U. S.--bah! She closed her eyes and pretended to forget.

During the next dozen years Argentina's name grew big in Europe and again last year she was persuaded to come to the U. S., ostensibly for her debut. This time managerial circumstances were different and she herself had grown artistically. She became a sensation.

Last week with far more confidence and 15 trunks full of costumes the now great Argentina landed for the third time in the U. S. For her first Manhattan program she gave five new dances and the audience cheered her louder than at the so-called debut a year ago (TIME, Nov. 19). Immediately thereafter she entrained for Buffalo, thence to Rochester. This year she will give some 60 recitals, go as far West as the Coast.

*Real name: Antonia Merce. Born in Buenos Aires, she is one of the few Argentinians who have pure Spanish blood. Her father, onetime premier danseur at the Madrid Opera, was a Castilian; her mother an Amlulasian.