Bumps, thumps and men with no trousers

It is not an art form for which I greatly care, but every five years or so I dip my toes into its waters, so to speak, to see if I have changed my mind. While still at school I saw Markova, Dolin, Helpmann and Fonteyn and from these great dancers grew my scepticism; later I saw Nureyev not only on the stage but in the flesh, wooing a young man in Kynance Mews through which, daily, I used to walk my dogs; and I have since seen great Russian companies on flying visits to the Coliseum - but always I have been too much aware of the bump, thump, mechanical grind and breathlessness of the business butting in on whatever magic it may have.

Ballet is an extraordinarily formal language, much affected, I imagine, by the exaggerated manners of European courts in the 17th and 18th centuries, but how could anyone ever have thought beautiful its posturing? I can just about accept as art the gymnastic skills of women who do the standing splits and patter tippytoed across the stage sounding like woodpeckers in slow motion, but the rictus grin with which they demand applause no matter how brief or plodding their performance is enough to make the sane man sick.

As for the men, strutting awkwardly with feet at a quarter to three and even, occasionally, with heels in front of toes - was there ever a more preposterous preparation for their few leaps and bounds? How ignominious for them, most of the time, to be the mere props and armatures of little women who must perform movements that they cannot do alone. And how unsexed they are by tights, all muscled buttocks from behind but with nothing but a padded mons veneris in the front. We ask of them the athleticism of the gymnast and the great high jumper, the same speed and height and stamina, yet, hidebound by tradition, they appear on stage with all the masculine appeal of a plucked capon. Can we not dispense with the ludicrous strut and profiles and the undersides of chins and, above all, give them costumes that restore their masculinity?

And the musicians in the pit? Forget orchestral quality, forget instruments in tune, forget harmony and melody, ignore the composer's genius - just feel the leaden beat, the thump, thump, thump of a monster metronome. But even this is not as maddening as the idiot audience forever interrupting with its clamorous applause, stretching what might have been 90 minutes of near entertainment into three hours of sheer tedium. Thank the Lord the opera season is again in swing at the Coliseum, though only with Victorian junk, and that not until 2013 need I see another ballet.