Aâneedle may draw a thread through printed pages to bind a book. In this little memoir, Iâfeel like a needle that drew a common thread though a segment of martial art history. This book details three interrelated activities:â(1) martial art studies, (2) involvement as founder of Via Media Publishing, producing a quarterly journal and books, and (3) teaching martial arts. Publishers, writers, researchers and serious martial art practitioners will benefit with the detailed overview of Via Media and its publications. Via Media produced the Journal of Asian Martial Arts, known for its...

This book presents the historical background of taijiquan (tai chi) in China and one of its major representatives, Xiong Yanghe (1889-1981). By providing the time and place of Xiong's life, his involvement in the military, and his emigration to Taiwan where he taught for decades, a rare view of the fullness of taiji is presented. He had the innate ability and the opportunities to study with many great teachers. The result was the Grandmaster Xiong was a teacher who embodied a stunning comprehension of taijiquan, including open-hand and weapon routines that are practiced solo or with a...

The themes in this Via Media bookâdrawn from Chinese history, culture, and martial arts experienceâare entwined in a fictional narrative to animate events envisaged to have occurred during the mid-eighteenth century. From the outset, a thin veil separates fact from fiction. Our story starts with a discovery. While conducting research at the Vatican Library on the Jesuit missions in China, two scholars find a folder of papers written in Chinese among documents belonging to Giuseppe Castiglione (1688â1766), a painter at the royal court in Beijing. The papers turn out to be written by a...