Worlds Apart: the Autobiography of a Dancer from Brooklyn

In this story of his first sixteen years, Robert ­Maiorano tells how a small boy who once wanted to be a ­Brooklyn Dodger became a world-renowned dancer. He ­describes the years of hard work, the arduous training, the ­frustrations, triumphs, and disappointments before he was accepted into the New York City Ballet. He details the fast-paced life of his tour with the company in ­Russia, where as a sixteen-year-old he danced for Khrushchev on the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Robert's story is one of many contrasts-of hope and despair, of love and sorrow, and of the two worlds in which he moved: the ­gang-ridden Brooklyn of the fifties and the brilliant, ­demanding, exciting world of the ballet.