Edgar Degas’ wax-and-fabric statuette Little Dancer Aged
Fourteen has held the curiosity of millions in its 28 bronze
reproductions, but far fewer know the heart-rending history of
the model, Marie van Goethem, and her sisters. In The Painted
Girls, a historically based work of fiction rich with
naturalistic details of late 19th century Paris, Cathy Marie
Buchanan paints the girls who spring from the page as vibrantly
as a dancer’s leap across a stage. Living in the slum of lower
Montmartre, the girls aspire to be dancers at the Paris Opera
Ballet, a resource for urchins to save themselves from life on
the streets. Practicing long hours and fighting exhaustion and
malnutrition, they could earn a meager income if they remain at
the lowest rank of petit rat, but they could lead lavish lives
if they climb to stardom. Such was the dream of the van Goethem
sisters. When the novel opens, 17-year-old Antoinette has been
dismissed from the ballet school for willfulness and
belligerence. Marie, unattractive and except