![]() In this picture book, she is encouraging a young African-American dancer to pursue her ballet dreams, telling her, “I was a dancer just like you/ a dreaming shooting star of girl with work and worlds ahead.” In 2007, she became ABT’s second African-American female soloist and the first in two decades.Ĭopeland became the first black female to perform Stravinsky’s "Firebird." This inspired her children’s picture book, "Firebird." It's illustrated in bright and bold colors by Christopher Myers, in sweeping motions that mimic the movements of dance. In 2000, at the age of 18, she moved to New York where she earned a spot in the American Ballet Theater’s Studio Company, and in 2010 became a member of the corps de ballet. Misty Copeland was a ballet prodigy, and after three months of lessons she was dancing en pointe, and in a little over a year was dancing professionally, unheard of in the field of ballet. Not only that, but she was African-American, trying to make a spot for herself in the world of classically trained ballet, where small, lithe body types were favored over muscular ones. She started ballet at the age of 13, when others her age had been training for 10 years. She lived in a motel room with five siblings. ![]()
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