Product Description

This is the first book to dissect the lore and reveal the origins and purpose of the art of shotokan. It describes how karate was invented by the world's only unarmed bodyguards to protect the world's only unarmed king against Americans. In 1853, before the American Civil War, the king of Okinawa was caught in a confrontation between the shogun's implacable samurai and an invading force of U.S. Marines. Trapped between katana and bayonets, the king's unarmed guards faced impossible odds and narrowly avoided a costly bloodbath.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #66492 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 329 pages

Customer Reviews

Gives real depth of understanding
Being only an interested beginner, in karate terms, I have been trying to find books to 'flesh out' the subject - this book is one of the best I have found.

The book is written from a very 'western' perspective - i.e. using reason, logic and especially skepticism - to counteract some of the misleading and inaccurate traditions that have built up over the years. The author fundamentally believes that everything within karate was designed to be practical and efficient. This assumption then leads to what many will believe is a speculative account of the history and invention of modern karate.

I feel that the historical account is very useful in understanding the psychology of many early practitioners of the art. If you keep in mind the contraversial nature of some of the material, then you can enjoy the well researched prose and numerous insightful observations made - particularly concerning cultural differences between east and west.

If you want to gain an understanding of how traditional karate practitioners view their art then this book would be a good starting point. Hopefully, it will encourage more karate students to question the information handed down as gospel by their senseis - particularly as much of it appears to be self-serving.

Be serious to read this !!!
Cracking book but not for the dabbler!! Bruce Claydon has carried out extensive research to write this book. He has clearly spend a very long time (and probably a great deal of money) to try to get inside karate and it's roots.
His writing style allows us to read the book almost as a novel and yet at the same time the reader is aware that this genuinely may be the secrets...not the myth...of the origins of shotokan karate. Highly recommended to anyone who believes that karate is more than just moving up and down the dojo.
Absolute must for your library...but keep an open mind as you read it..Bruce challenges almost everything!!!

The most radical and eye opening book in a very long time
I was reccomended this book by Iain Abernethy (author of Bunkai-Jutsu). His comment to me was "Once I started reading it, I just couldn't put it down till I'd finished it". I read the book this way 4 times!
Unfortunately, the book is about 50 years too late in some respects. The die has been set, and the Shotokan practitioners around the world are pretty much (but not completely...) going to do it the way they always have. There are however, a very few of us, who have a serious interest in uncovering the true origins of so called "modern Karate". For me, this book is not late, but smack on time....it fills in the huge gaps in understanding I have about Karate (despite enormous amounts of reading). Bruces' research, hypothesis and subsequent discussion of the material is exemplory. Like any good piece of research, he provides the salient facts with depth and conviction, yet he does not insist his observations are "the truth". There is no such thing in the case of Okinawan Karate history anyway.
To my mind, this work is probably the most important to have come forward about the subject of Karate (specifically the origins of Shuri-te/Shotokan) since Karate was introduced to mainland Japan. Quite simply, no one has ever done this before. It is ground breaking, and as such will contradict the strongly held beliefs of many Karateka. So if you are dyed in the wool JKA/JKS, then prepare to be rocked to the core. If you have an open mind, it's just going to get stretched!