Pencak Silat: Through My Eyes [Paperback]

Herman Suwanda (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 343 pages
• Publisher: Empire Books (October 31, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1933901039
• ISBN-13: 978-1933901039
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 7.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,228,691 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book on Mande Munda History, May 27, 2007

By 

FD "FD" (Seattle) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Pencak Silat: Through My Eyes (Paperback)

I really enjoyed reading the book.
It gives a glimpse of background on Mande Muda and Pak Herman Suwanda.
The book shows the Silat styles that make up Mande Muda.
I wish the book had more in depth coverage of the Silat styles of Mande Muda.
As a matter of fact, that is one of the reasons I didn't give it a 5 star.
The other reason is that the book had about 2 chapters covering the Indonesian History. I would've prefered less coverage of the Indonesian History and more coverage on the Indonesian Silat.
The Indonesian history chapters are outlines. I fell asleep most of the time in history class during grade and elementary school in Indonesia. So I guess this was a good way for me to catch up *haha*
Nonetheless a good book on Mande Muda history. I wouldn't recommend this book if you're looking at technique or jurus illustrations. There are other Silat books that cover techniques and jurus better.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars highly recommended, May 15, 2007

By 

Dragan Milojevic (Serbia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pencak Silat: Through My Eyes (Paperback)

I really like the way this book is organized. Admitedly, I would like some of the chapters shorter (history of Indonesia, without relevance to silat) and some others longer (technical portion, eg. jurus and their buah), but than again, there is no such thing as a perfect book.
This time, though, I think than Mr. Somera did a great job as an editor (well, maybe some linguistic details could have been more correct...but than again, maybe that would not give us closer image of Herman Suwanda). The material is well presented and I especially like the order of chapters. In my view, the reflections of some more prominent students of the late Pak Herman included after the technical portion, are beautifullt done and really make those reders (myself included) who never had the chance to meet the man, start understanding the impact he had on people around him.
I would wholehartedly recommend this book to anyone interested in martial arts, and for those into silat, I'd say it's a must read.
By now you might be wondering why not 5 start then? Because I feel that this book does not meet the expectations, i.e. the potential it had. If it had mor in depth presentation ofthe technical material (like in book on Leo Giron for example) to make it a little bit better rounded, I would not hesitate giving it 5/5 rating.

Here again, my complain about the shipping conditions stand once more. I held Amazon in very high regard as a company, so they should not allow for mistakes like changing the shipping method without customer's consent.