Before I study this e-book, I only realized that Bruce Lee had been a martial arts motion picture star. I had in no way witnessed a person of his films or study anything about him. I had no plan what a fascinating person he was-not only was he a great athlete, but I was pleasantly astonished to uncover what an incredible artist and thinker he was. In truth, “artist” far better defines him than “athlete,” in my viewpoint, since as Tommy Gong exhibits in “Bruce Lee: The Evolution of a Martial Artist,” Bruce Lee was devoted to his art, continuously learning variety and finding out how to make improvements to it, trying to get to make it the formless form that could by no means come to be stagnant by creating it adhere to difficult principles.
Gong retells Bruce Lee’s lifetime story by concentrating on his improvement of his own kind, Jeet Kune Do. Gong explores the a few most important intervals of Lee’s advancement and instructing although dwelling in Oakland, Seattle, and Los Angeles at distinctive occasions in his existence. By interviewing Lee’s previous students, Gong uncovered significant variations in what they ended up taught. The final result is a new comprehension of Lee’s strategies and the evolution of his formless form of Jeet Kune Do, and a near search at the philosophical beliefs Lee held about martial arts and about existence alone.
Any one previously common with Lee and his martial arts will discover all the aspects wanted right here to get that knowledge to a new level, together with the curriculums Lee gave his college students, the influences on Lee, and his own feelings and needs to develop his art. Gong states that the book’s intent is to answer the problem, “What drove him [Lee] to modify his strategies and coaching solutions, influencing his path and enhancement as a martial artist?”
What I discovered most awesome about this e book is that even though it could be applied to understand and improve one’s have technique, full with pictures of several moves and stances, much more importantly, it reveals Lee’s philosophy driving producing Jeet Kune Do and his refusal to capitalize on building a sort that could be taught in a franchise of educational institutions simply because he understood the students would endure as a result. Lee insisted on personally teaching Jeet Kune Do to his students, and he did not hope them to comply with his procedures accurately but to use what they could and develop their own skills according to what labored ideal for each and every one particular. Amongst the several numerous quotes in the ebook from Lee about the growth of Jeet Kune Do, Lee states, “Guy, the living creature, the creating person, is usually more essential than any recognized design and style,” and “The perform of Jeet Kune Do is to liberate, not to bind.” Gong adds, “He inspired followers to blaze their possess paths in their particular improvement and excellence in martial arts, to have religion and have faith in in by themselves when taking directions that may even stray off the Bruce Lee route.”
Lee understood that martial arts was about considerably additional than physical fighting. He mentioned, “To me, at the very least the way that I teach it, all kinds of understanding eventually necessarily mean self-knowledge. So, there are people today coming in and inquiring me to teach them not so considerably how to defend on their own or how to do any person in. Somewhat, they want to master to specific them selves via some movement, be it anger, be it determination or whatever. So, in other words, they’re paying me to clearly show them, in combative form, the art of expressing the human entire body.”
Much more than an athlete, movie star, or artist, Lee was also a thinker. He was an adamant believer in constructive pondering and even wrote poetry with a favourable information to it. He thought in the religious aspect of his artwork, stating, “Jeet Kune Do, ultimately, is not a subject of petty technique but of hugely produced private spirituality and physique. It is not a question of producing what has by now been designed but of recovering what has been still left driving. These points have been with us, in us, all the time and have by no means been missing or distorted other than by our misguided manipulation of them. JKD is not a make a difference of technological innovation but of religious insight and schooling.”
After looking through “Bruce Lee: The Evolution of a Martial Artist,” I am now an admirer of Lee. I have a great regard for not only his physical but his mental prowess. He devoted himself to his artwork, reading every thing he could from textbooks on fencing and wrestling to Chinese philosophy and self-enable publications. He was additional than a martial artist he was a liberator of gentleman. In a 1971 posting in “Black Belt” journal, he said, “we must realize the incontrovertible actuality that regardless of their several vibrant origins (by a sensible, mysterious monk, by a distinctive messenger in a dream, or in a holy revelation) designs are produced by adult men. A style must under no circumstances be deemed gospel truth, the legislation and ideas of which can never be violated. Man, the dwelling, building individual, is normally a lot more important than any founded style.”
Now I fully grasp why Bruce Lee grew to become an icon and stays a residence identify forty several years following his dying. It truly is not because he was a terrific martial artist, not simply because he experienced a wonderful physique but for the reason that he had an inquisitive thoughts and a great soul that permitted him to reach that wonderful skill and physique, and to create a legacy that will live on for generations to occur.
Anybody who is a Bruce Lee fan will enjoy this book as effectively for its several photos and anecdotes about Bruce Lee. It is a wonderful testament to a terrific male, and I feel like my everyday living has been enriched by getting go through it.