Lena Borisova (40 years) Smolensk, Russia/ Waco, TX, U.S.A.

Dalida and me... My story has two chapters. In a sense, I have known Dalida since the 70s, since my early youth. But it is also true that I have just rediscovered her. I remember in the 70s and 80s they often showed her on tv in Russia (at that time the former Soviet Union), and I as a girl, not knowing a word in French, liked watching how beautifully she sang and danced. Then I remember how unthinkable May 1987 was... Afterwards, life led me away from French chanson. And here I am, living in the U.S., already 40. Last summer I was taking a class "French for Reading Knowledge," and decided to try my new skills and see whether I could understand the songs I had liked as a teen. When I heard Dali, it was both recognition and revelation. Only now, having learned to understand French and having acquired 40 years of life experience was I able to truly understand and appreciate all the depth and immensity, power and subtlety of her talent both of a singer and of a dramatic actress. I have been mesmerized with her ability to communicate with her voice superfine vibrations of emotion, and draw one into her aura, with her iconographic beauty and impeccable taste that every woman would want to imitate, but none ever will. Because of her artistic intuition she managed to do something that no one ever could. When non-Russians sing Russian songs or make movies about Russian, as a rule, it sounds fake: it comes out either as superficial, or overloaded with ethnic flavor, or even as a mockery, but never right. With Dali it is different. In her songs related to Russia ("Les temps des fleurs," "L'amour qui venait du froid," "Le temps d'aimer," and "Spiel Balalaïka") she was the only one, who, not being Russian herself, was able to grasp and express that elusive Russianness that is called "the Russian soul"... How do I know? When I listen to these songs, they make me homesick... After so many years, Dali has reentered my life, filled it up, transformed and enriched it in so many very tangible ways. Because of her, Dostoyevsky's maxim, "Beauty will save the world," has become full of meaning. Beauty has a force that is not subject to death, and it is not a lifeless cliché or wishful thinking. I know, know inside, that beauty will save the world, because every day it saves a small part of this world – me. Every day Dali saves me with her songs: saves from loneliness and despair, from dreariness and futility, from cold and unbelief ... She has helped me to reconnect with something really real in the world and in myself that I thought I had lost. And I am forever thankful to her. Dear Dali, thank you, thank you...