The Inner Game of Fencing: Excellence in Form, Technique, Strategy and Spirit. [Paperback]

Nick Evangelista (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 11, 2000

To defeat an opponent, a fencer must use mind and body together -- anticipating attacks, observing the opponent, making contact with the blade, combining strategy with technique. This is the inner game of the sport, which takes years of patience and hard work to reach, but for many it is the most enticing aspect of fencing. Nick Evangelista explains how a fencer can take his or her skills to the next level through self-discipline, continuous learning, and practice.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

McGraw-Hill authors represent the leading experts in their fields and are dedicated to improving the lives, careers, and interests of readers worldwide

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (January 11, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1570282307
• ISBN-13: 978-1570282300
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #246,657 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #16 in Books > Sports & Outdoors > Individual Sports > Fencing

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Reach deeper and come out on top with this book, December 9, 2001

By 

Roberta A. Peart (Peabody, Ma United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Inner Game of Fencing: Excellence in Form, Technique, Strategy and Spirit. (Paperback)

I read The Inner Game of Fencing before I read my other favorite, the Art and Science of Fencing, and I'm glad I did. This book was instrumental in instilling the confidence I needed to act on my curiosity of the sport of fencing. Nick Evangelista believes that fencing belongs to everyone, not only the athletes pursuing Olympic notoriety. He makes it clear that you have just as much a right to be at the salle learning to be a recreational fencer, as does the dedicated sport fencer.
This book unmasks the mysteries of the fencing world by using wisdom and reasoning. You'll find more than just a "how to" list." Strategies are shown to be a mindset rather than any complex technique. Even a beginner has a fighting chance of winning when the mind and hand and feet work together. Most fencing books only address the latter two. The Inner Game will give you the edge you need to make your fencing goals materialize.
The format of the book is such that the busy person can open up to any page and read as little or as much as time allows and walk away with encouragement and prowess. Not only is Nick's wisdom imparted in this book, he includes quotes from past fencing masters that would have been lost had this book not brought their truth and substance forth to the new generations of fencers.

27 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Definitely a must-buy!, March 8, 2000

By 

Christoph Amberger (Baltimore, MD USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Inner Game of Fencing: Excellence in Form, Technique, Strategy and Spirit. (Paperback)

Fencing is all about achieving an end. And that's exactly where the readership of *The Inner Game* will neatly divide into separate factions at odds with each other, with the author, and with the entire book.

For the one group, fencing means setting off a green or red light as quickly and decisively as possible. The end justifies the means: you punch, jump (with both feet of the ground), flick, or (sometimes) actually parry-riposte to achieve this end. Win the bout. The tournament. The Nationals. And find your name somewhere on the "train schedules" published in *American Fencing*. Nothing wrong with that: If fencing to you is a magnificent competitive sport that involves hitting an opponent no matter how (as long as it is within the FIE rules), I'd agree with you. It is... among other things. But this book may not be for you.

Because if you take the Art of Fencing in its intellectual complexity... a parable of human life, maturation, truth, and social interaction, you enter into what Evangelista calls The Inner Game of Fencing. This Inner Game is about integrity and logical cohesion of mind and body, of strategy and movement... in short, a complex interaction of will, mind, and motion that will only open itself up to the individual who searches, probes, ponders, and questions the quick fixes and shortcuts convenience and short-term purpose dictate in modern competitive fencing.

Evangelista has chosen a somewhat off-beat format for his book. It is less a prescriptive tractate that tries to please and coddle as it instructs. It is more a collection of individual insights... sometimes gruff, sometimes unflattering... but always honest, just as they were gathered and hard-fought for over decades of a man's and fencer's life.

In a way, *The Inner Game* comprises the quintessence of what a serious student of fencing might glean from individual conversations with an experienced master over a decade of lessons.

If you're looking for a book telling you how to set off a buzzer a split second earlier than your oppenent... go practice. If you have come to see fencing and swordplay as a process involving the lifelong pursuit of certain human truths, you might be tempted to put it next to Nadi's *On Fencing* and Musashi's *Book of 5 Rings*.

That's where I put my copy.

21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not for the Sport at heart, March 15, 2000

By 

Jim Pellus (Missouri) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Inner Game of Fencing: Excellence in Form, Technique, Strategy and Spirit. (Paperback)

Having read "The Art and Science of Fencing" by Nick Evangelista, I was eagerly awaiting the arrival of his newest book "The Inner Game of Fencing" and I was not dissappointed. Classical fencing, or the "art" of fencing is a balance between technique, form, strategy, and spirit, and that is exactly what Maestro Evangelista addresses in this book. It is obvious he writes from an appreciation of an art which is being over run by a game concerned only with touches. If your interest in fencing lies merely in the goal of racking up touches, regardless of how you achieve that objective, then this book is not going to do much for you. But, if you believe fencing is a true ''Martial Art,'' requiring discipline, where every move, every position, every thought has a specific purpose, then I highly recommend this reading.