Editing Anna Pavlova (section)

==Early life==
Anna Matveyevna Pavlova was born in the [[Preobrazhensky Regiment]] hospital, [[Saint Petersburg]] where her father, Matvey Pavlovich Pavlov, served.<ref>''Vera Krasovskaya (1972)''. Russian Ballet Theatre at the Beginning of the XX Century. Dancers // A. P. Pavlova, birth certificate. – Leningrad: Iskusstvo, p. 229</ref> Some sources say that her parents married just before her birth, others—years later. Her mother, Lyubov Feodorovna Pavlova, came from peasants and worked as a laundress at the house of a Russian-Jewish banker, [[Lazar Polyakov]], for some time. When Anna rose to fame, Polyakov's son Vladimir claimed that she was an illegitimate daughter of his father; others speculated Matvey came from [[Crimean Karaites]] (there is a monument in one of [[Yevpatoria]]'s [[kenesa]]s dedicated to Pavlova), yet both legends find no historical proof.<ref>Oleg Kerensky quotes Vladmir Polyakov—the son of Lazar Polyakov who claims that Anna was an illegitimate daughter of his father (Oleg Kerensky. Anna Pavlova. N-Y., Dutton Publ., 1973. {{ISBN|0-525-17658-6}})</ref><ref name="dandre">Victor Dandré (2016). ''My Wife – Anna Pavlova''. – Moscow: Algorithm, pp. 5, 36 {{ISBN|978-5-906880-01-7}}.</ref> Anna Matveyevna changed her patronymic to Pavlovna when she started performing on stage.<ref>''[[Michel Fokine]] (1981)''. Against the Current. Memoirs of Ballet Master. – Leningrad: Iskusstvo, pp. 384–385</ref>

[[File:Fairy Tale - Students of the Imperial Ballet School. 1891.JPG|thumb|Students of the Imperial Ballet School, St. Petersburg, in Marius Petipa's ''[[A Fairy Tale (ballet)|Un conte de fées]]''. A ten-year-old A
Pavlova (kneeling on left, holding birdcage) appeared in her first ever ballet performance. 1891.]]

Pavlova was a [[preterm birth|premature child]], regularly felt ill and was soon sent to the [[Ligovo]] village where her grandmother looked after her.<ref name='dandre'/> Pavlova's passion for the art of [[ballet]] took off when her mother took her to a performance of [[Marius Petipa]]'s original production of ''[[The Sleeping Beauty (ballet)|The Sleeping Beauty]]'' at the [[Imperial Maryinsky Theatre]] in 1890. The lavish spectacle made an impression on Pavlova. When she was nine, her mother took her to audition for the [[Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet|Imperial Ballet School]]. Because of her youth and sickly appearance, she was rejected, but, at age 10, in 1891, she was accepted. She appeared for the first time on stage in Petipa's ''[[A Fairy Tale (ballet)|Un conte de fées]]'' (''A Fairy Tale''), which the ballet master staged for the students of the school.{{sfn|Andreeva|2019}}