Her wishes notwithstanding, it is not likely that Graham will be remembered as a dancer, at least not very clearly: films of her performances are scarce and mostly primitive. Much of her choreography has failed to wear well, especially by comparison with the work of George Balanchine, the unrivaled master of neoclassical ballet, and Taylor and Cunningham, her apostate alumni. No more than half a dozen of her dances, most notably Cave of the Heart and Appalachian Spring (1944), her radiant re-creation of a pioneer wedding, seem likely to stand the test of time. The rest are overwrought period pieces whose humorless, lapel-clutching intensity is less palatable now that their maker is no longer around to bring them to life.

Yet a theatrical legacy cannot always be measured by such seemingly objective yardsticks. Though there is no film of Nijinsky dancing, no one questions his place of honor in the history of 20th century ballet. Even if her beleaguered company should someday close its doors and her dances cease to be performed, Graham will doubtless be remembered in much the same way, for the shadow she cast was fully as long. Did she invent modern dance? No, but she came to embody it, arrogantly and spectacularly — and, it appears, permanently. "When the legend becomes fact," said the newspaper editor in John Ford's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, "print the legend." The legend of Martha Graham long ago became fact, just as her utterly personal technique has become part of the common vocabulary of dancers everywhere. "The center of the stage is where I am," she once said. It still is.

TIME contributing writer Terry Teachout covers dance for the New York Daily News

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