the best book on bunkai for shotokan, May 12, 2007

By Odin Guirado Marcelo (Montevideo, Uruguay)  

This is the first book which is both complete and believable about bunkai of the Shotokan Kata. 

Most books on bunkai include a couple applications, some nice, some rather doubtful. In this case, each and every application of the kata is believable and practical. 

A curious fact: Gennosuke Higaki is the name of the villain in the movie Sanshiro Sugata, about the early days of Judo.

 

By David Wong "David" (California)

I took karate 30 years ago and learned the kata as instructed in my dojo. Why? "Because if you wanted your belt, you need to know the kata" Like the author states it was viewed by all of us as little more than a series of exercises we did as preliminary to get to the "real karate". It never occurred to us that maybe kata was a useful fighting tool, and even less so that perhaps our masters did not even themselves realize the value of the kata! 

Three cheers to Gennosuke Higaki for writing this book and sharing his knowledge and insight to the true meaning and use of katas and how to unravel the hidden techniques of the ancient masters! 

After you read this book you will never look at kata the same way again. Already, when practicing and repracticing kata I see things I never noticed before. 

If you only buy one book on kata and bunkai, get this one!

   This One Is It !, May 19, 2007 By paul

Get it ! Enjoy it ! And ask your trainer to change his sport oriented Karate curriculum to something baking that bunkai into your muscle memory ! Many thanks to the author for sharing his knowledge so generously with us - Gennosuke Higaki is, to mention, a psyeudonym choosen by the author BECAUSE it is the name of a villain in the movie "Sanshiro Sugata", it is not his name.

   A different view, August 28, 2007 By MAB 

This book gives a different take on applications of kata moves and tries to solve the riddle of the true meaning of kata. Very interesting to read and apply and is an extremely useful addition to the any karateka's library. Well done on an excellent book.

   Sugoi!, August 23, 2007 By karateka4life (Minneapolis, MN)

I began training in sport karate almost 10 years ago but later changed to Shotokan because I wanted something more practical and traditional. After a while, I realized that the two styles were much the same in competition. The only real differences were the basics (hip movement) and the katas. Unfortunately, I always learned the basic, non-functional bunkai of the katas. I knew there had to be more and this, my friends, is it. This book begins by explaining the history of karate and exactly why the real techniques were hidden and how the ancient combat art developed into the modern sport. I don't know enough on my own to say whether the author is correct or not, but he has plenty of credible quotes to back up his views. It also explains just what a kata is and why ancient masters would only study 2 or 3 katas and know complete fighting systems from each of them. Next, it outlines the principles used to determine whether an application of a kata technique is correct or not. Some notable examples are: the front hand strikes, immobilize the opponent and then strike, meanings have been hidden, and no attack ends in a block. This section will be very helpful for me in further studying bunkai. Finally, there are detailed explanations for the applications of the katas in question with many photographs. It was amazingly clear just how to apply each technique. I don't think I've ever seen a book about a sport explain how to do the movements so clearly (of course, a good karate background is helpful for some parts of this). This is the first book on bunkai I've read and I found it amazing. It would be nice if it had applications of the katas against moves besides oi-zuki, but even so, it shouldn't be a big step to apply the moves against a big, wild punch or even a tackle. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in deepening his or her understanding of karate as a self-defense art.

   A must have !, July 13, 2007 By Goran Matosevic (Croatia)  

This is the best karate kata book that I bought in last years. It realy givs you a lot of information in simple way. A must have !!! Buy it and you wont regret! 

 If you want to understand Kata and Bunkai then get this book!, July 7, 2007 

By David Wong "David" (California) 

I took karate 30 years ago and learned the kata as instructed in my dojo. Why? "Because if you wanted your belt, you need to know the kata" Like the author states it was viewed by all of us as little more than a series of exercises we did as preliminary to get to the "real karate". It never occurred to us that maybe kata was a useful fighting tool, and even less so that perhaps our masters did not even themselves realize the value of the kata! 

Three cheers to Gennosuke Higaki for writing this book and sharing his knowledge and insight to the true meaning and use of katas and how to unravel the hidden techniques of the ancient masters! 

After you read this book you will never look at kata the same way again. Already when practicing and repracticing kata I see things I never noticed before. 

If you only buy one book on kata and bunkai, get this one!

   This One Is It !, May 19, 2007 By paul

Get it ! Enjoy it ! And ask your trainer to change his sport oriented Karate curriculum to something baking that bunkai into your muscle memory ! Many thanks to the author for sharing his knowledge so generously with us - Gennosuke Higaki is, to mention, a psyeudonym choosen by the author BECAUSE it is the name of a villain in the movie "Sanshiro Sugata", it is not his name.

the best book on bunkai for shotokan, May 12, 2007

By Odin Guirado Marcelo (Montevideo, Uruguay) 

This is the first book which is both complete and believable about bunkai of the Shotokan Kata. Most books on bunkai include a couple applications, some nice, some rather doubtful. In this case, each and every application of the kata is believable and practical. A curious fact: Gennosuke Higaki is the name of the villain in the movie Sanshiro Sugata, about the early days of Judo.