Читать книгу Traditions. Essays on the Japanese Martial Arts and Ways онлайн

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Sixteen years ago, when I was preparing for a trip to Japan to further my study of the budo and of Japanese culture, I got a call from the editor of Black Belt Magazine. Would I be interested in writing a monthly column on the traditional aspects of karate and the budo in general? I was surprised at the offer. At that time, the “martial arts” in the United States were dominated by violent films and by gaudy public exhibitions and contests. A number of innovators were creating new forms of self-defense and personal combat that had been freed from the “classical mess” of the past. The martial disciplines were becoming “Westernized,” which was allegedly an improvement for them and which was going to make them more meaningful or at least more palatable to the non-Japanese enthusiast. Concepts like budo philosophy or traditional training methods were either being ignored or dismissed as archaic or categorized as that most egregious of failings in this end of the present century: irrelevant. I could not imagine much of a readership for such a column. But I took the offer anyway. And as it has been more than once in my writing career, my editor was correct. I began to hear from readers in response to my columns.