Davka: I Will Dance

Davka: I Will Dance is a memoir by a hidden child of the holocaust who discovers a passion for ballroom dancing and tango in her late 60's. The narrative shifts back and forth between the more recent twenty years of dancing (from the ages of 68-82) and older memories from childhood, adolescence and adulthood in Europe and the United States, creating a moving and often hilarious contrast between the author's past, her everyday life as a somewhat anxious and modest senior citizen, and her wild and romantic adventures in the sometimes-seedy and always fabulous dance world. Naomi Silver, the narrator, reflects in short vignettes upon the challenges and joys of her ongoing process of learning to dance better, the ins and outs of dance socials, performances, finding and keeping partners, the glitz and glamour of costuming, her marriage, divorce, love affairs, and the tricky etiquette of dance-teacher allegiance - all against a backdrop of intermittent hauntings from her childhood experiences in Germany and Belgium, experiences that threatened to hold her back from a fully joyous life. The book is an inspirational celebration of a life-long struggle to defeat the devil through dance.