Alastair Macaulay: “It was hard not to think of politics when watching the Bolshoi’s repertory – which was entirely pre-glasnost. Seeing the tedious mix of Swan Lake (in Yuri Grigorovich’s dismal production), Don Quixote (in Alexei Fadeyechev’s version) and Spartacus (all Grigorovich and all hokum) was to feel the clock turned back 40 years.”