The Art and Science of Fencing

Rating:
Summary: The Best!
Review: I have read the bad reviews of Mr. Evangelista's books, especially this book, and I do not recognize The Art and Science of Fencing in these reviews. Mr. Evangelista gives established reasons for what he says, reasons based in classical fencing. His statements are not made up, but have been said in other ways, in other times, for hundreds of years. Interestingly, many of Mr. Evangelista's views are now being echoed at the highest levels of coaching in the Federation Internationale d'Ecrime, the world fencing organization, something these negative reviewers are apparently ignorant of.

As for the use of pistol grips, there is a difference in the way a French grip and a pistol grip are employed. It is a fact that you cannot achieve the finesse of finger control with pistol grips. If anyone reading this review watched any Olympic fencing on TV recently, you will realize this -- even if you are not an exprienced fencer. Moreover, I have read a legitimate sports medicine study regarding fencing on the internet that has linked all broken blade injuries -- both lethal and non-lethal -- to the use of pistol grips. The "death grip" they generate is more than just words.

The Art and Science of Fencing, regardless of its pictures, is a valuable book on the sport. Why those who identify themselves as sport fencers by condemning the traditional fencing practices and values espoused in this book is obvious: Mr. Evangelista is "criticizing" them by upholding concepts like control, self-discipline, and the logic of the "what if these blades were sharp" game.

I undrstand that The Art and Science of Fencing has sold literally thousands of copies. This is no surprise. It is an excellent book. An aspiring fencing student can do nothing better to help create a solid foundation than purchasuing a copy and reading it many times. Not only is it educational, it is inspirational.



Rating:
Summary: More vendetta than fencing instruction
Review: For the record, I am an intermediate sports fencer with a great appreciation for classical fencing. My first coach used to annul points in class if she felt they weren't proper hits. Also, I fence foil and epee with a french grip.

As much as I want to like this book, I find less and less reason to go back to it. A HUGE part of it is taken up by Evangelista's personal hatred of pistol grips (which will apparently cripple your abilities so badly that you will never achieve even mediocrity), and people who have the audacity to fence bouts within their first year (which is even worse for your skills than the pistol grip). Anyone who works hard at modern sport fencing (i.e. not classical fencing) is a "poker" or a "brute." There simply is no room in his world for anything other than HIS style of fencing, and he spends nearly a third of the book reminding you of that fact.

But then we come to the fencing instruction itself. My first question is, "where are the pictures?" What few graphics are in the book are often pointless photographs or seventeenth century woodcuts of people being stabbed. These are very pretty, but they shouldn't be there if they edge out illustrative diagrams in an instructional book.

Some of the instruction is quite helpful and well done. The style is generally straightforward and simple. The sections on epee and sabre are woefully inadequate though, as is the case with most modern fencing books. Some of the instruction completely contradicts what my coaches (and my own experience) tell me. I'll be charitable and chalk that up to different ways of doing things.

Ultimately, this just isn't a good book. Too much of it is ranting, and the fencing parts are spotty in their information. It's not entirely useless, but be forwarned if you consider it.

Rating:
Summary: Good Reference, Decent for Beginners, Could be Better.
Review: If this book was written for beginners, then it comes close to being very good. As a beginner who has never fenced, my perspective is bound to be different from that of most reviewers who seem to have more experience. In all, this book is neither completely good nor is it bad. It has some positives and negatives.

On the positive side, the quality of the cover and binding are very high. Most books I have seen on this subject are published by independants who cut corners in the quality of the book. Not this book. The high quality of publishing makes it easier to read.

There's also a lot of good historical content in the book. Whatver one thinks of Mr. Evangelista's personal opinions about classical versus modern fencing, there's enough info for the beginner to get a good feel for fencing's background.

The book's shortcomings are, however, significant. The technical sections might have been good, but they were weakened by poor pictures. Since most of the sections outline movements, directional arrows are essential for a beginner trying to learn the correct basic movement. Granted, using this book in conjunction with coaching probably answers those questions. But what's the point of a picture if it's not useful? In addition, many pictures were simply too dark and needed to be replaced with better ones.

As for the author's claims of training many championship fencers, to me the validity of that matters less than the content itself.

All in all this is a fairly good book that is worth a read but is not enough to start out with.