Journeying Toward Center with the late Nancy Topf

Abstract

I recently expressed to a friend my desire to “stay centered” during a challenging situation. Although my friend and I both intuitively understood the meaning of this common phrase, my own understanding of “center” was challenged and enriched while reading the late Nancy Topf’s newly published book, aptly subtitled The Anatomy of Center. Topf developed and founded Topf Technique/Dynamic AnatomyVR , a somatic practice in the Ideokinetic lineage of Mabel Todd and Barbara Clark. A dancer who came to somatic work for the same reason so many do—a desire to move with freedom and without pain—Topf’s life and the documentation of her life’s research were tragically cut short by a plane crash in 1998. Her longtime student Hetty King took on the task of editing and publishing Topf’s manuscript. In doing so, King has provided somatic practitioners, dancers, dance educators, and those seeking strategies for embodied living with an invaluable resource. King has clearly divided Topf’s writing into digestible chapters describing distinct anatomical regions of the body—such as mouth, the feet and hands, and the crucial psoas at the center of it all. The reader is guided along a non-linear but logical path through the body, as each chapter offers visualizations, images, and philosophical ideas about anatomy. The chapters can be approached independently and yet are interdependent, creating a web-like understanding of the body through overlapping experiences and concepts. The book is a workbook, and the reader is explicitly instructed to take time with the offered images and exercises. I couldn’t ignore this instruction; Topf’s thoughtful writing and attention to detail inspired me to read the text with care. I consumed small chunks of each chapter over many weeks, and Topf’s movement explorations and visualizations immediately made their way into my dancing and teaching practices. Although a newcomer to this technique, I heard Topf’s voice permeating the book, and I felt intimately guided by her kindness, patience, and humor. A sense of whimsy pervades the text; each exploration is relayed