This book is a good read if you are interested in the historical and cultural foundations of T'ai Chi. It suffers a little bit from bad editing (possibly done by a computer spellchecker?). The author shares his knowledge of T'ai Chi by way of explaining how deeply-held Chinese beliefs almost inevitably resulted in the art of playing T'ai Chi. I did not find it tedious at all. Most of the black and white figures were very helpful and well done, although one or two sequences (e.g. those showing a woman practicing "T'ai Chi Walking") were not as well explained as they might have been. This book would probably be less enjoyable for a reader who had no prior knowledge of T'ai Chi but regular Players will find it an interesting addition.

Arieh Lev Breslow presents a very academic study of Tai Chi Chuan and its cultural and historical roots. He is quite thourough in his detective work into the understanding of religious belief that influenced Tai Chi (in an information based manner), but so thourough that at a couple points it becomes a dry read (Hence the three stars instead of five). Stick with it though! After suffering through a couple sections of footnote after footnote Breslow brings it all back together in a manner that will excite the mind and reach the spirit. He does well to explain quotes of the Tai Chi Classics in modes that westerners will understand.

His observations of how to perform Tai Chi Chuan in the second half of the book serve to demonstrate the expert understanding that he has for this art form. This book is an excellent choice for anyone who really has interest in Chinese culture and an essential history for those who practice Tai Chi and are looking to go deeper.

Arieh Lev Breslow has been teaching T'ai Chi for over 20 years, the last 14 at the Jerusalem School of T'ai Chi Ch'uan, which he founded in Israel. In Beyond The Closed Door he provides us a well documented and fascinating journey through 4500 years of Chinese culture leading to the creation of T'ai Chi Ch'uan. The amazing part is that he does it in less than 400 pages, using clear layman's terms, keeping you interested with every chapter.

Beyond The Closed Door is not a "how to do T'ai Chi" text. The book is divided into four main sections. Breslow begins with an overview of Chinese Culture showing the importance of the development of the concept of Yin and Yang. We are introduced to the familiar characters of Confucius, Lao Tzu and Chang Tzu and their ideas and influences. Breslow show us that many of the concepts of today's forms have roots deep within ancient Chinese culture.

From there we begin to understand the development of Chinese Religion and Philosophical thought. Influences of Confucianism and Buddhism along with the rise and fall of many political regimes all contribute to and draw upon Taoism - resulting in all three becoming the supporting legs of Chinese culture well into the 20th century.

The history of China is indeed a colorful one, full of traditions, science, religion, mystics and philosophy. But it is also one filled with violence, warfare, political strife and the rise and destruction of many empires. Breslow shows us in a clear and logical manner that thousands of years of this ebb and flow (dare I say Yin and Yang) of conflict gave rise to many well-developed concepts, past on master to student in the grandest of oral traditions. All of this history evolving finally, into the creation of T'ai Chi Ch'uan.

T'ai Chi is much more than the forms many practice. Beyond The Closed Door opens up the world behind the forms. "To understand the origins and practice of T'ai Chi is to gain a profound insight into the culture from which it came." I found the book a captivating, fascinating, and accessible exploration of the wonderful view of the universe we know as T'ai Chi. I think you will enjoy it.

I would just like to say that from the cover of the book, it is misleading from the Brothers Grimm version of Cinderella. There isn't a pumpkin, mice, a glass slipper, and there is only one horse. I think that the illustrator needs to check the actual Grimm story.

It saddens me to see the review (above or below) which clearly has nothing to do with this audiotape but which may discourage people from trying these cassettes. This is an EXCELLENT version of the Cinderella story--as are all of the Monterey Soundworks versions that I have heard so far.

My daughter and I listen to these tapes during her 40 minute drive home from school each day, or on her way to skating, karate, etc., since we live in the New Jersey suburbs and spend a lot of time in the car. All of the Monterey Soundworks tapes are faithful to the original stories, and facilitate listening because there are different voices for each role. That means even very young children can distinguish points of view and get access to stories otherwise reserved for older listeners.

In the case of learning disabled children, this feature is even more pertinent, and has led us to collect all of the Monterey soundworks tapes available.

I highly recommend in particular this version of Cinderella, as it is universally enjoyable and comprehensible and makes the monotony of driving in even rush hour traffic a more pleasant experience.

Yeh Shen is a Chinese version of Cinderella. The sweet and gentle girl has a fish for a pet. The sister and mother are still the villian in this story, but goodness wins out. The unique twist to this version make it a wonderful addition to any collection.

I was very disappointed in this biography, it could have been so much better if it had been expanded and some actual insight into Mr. Liang's character and life had been included, instead of a collection of memories and stories loosely gathered and haphazardly put together. While I'm not trying to offend Mr. Olson with this review and I'm sure that he is a wonderful teacher and that his art is very good, I think that a ghost writer and more careful editing would have done wonders for this book about someone who was obviously a great man.

The book is confusing: it's poorly written and doesn't give sufficient detail on any of the topics that it touches on. To an extent, Mr. Olson seems to be talking to people who are already very familiar with Mr. Liang's life story - the book is written more like a summary of his life rather than a detailed biography. Frankly, almost everything that you'll discover in the book is written on the back cover. The only exception to that are the endless anecdotes included at the end of the book. These are included without context and while the author goes to great lengths to explain why they are included, it would have been much more natural for them to be written into the body of the work, rather than added as some sort of appendix.

Please ignore the reviewer who stated that this book is the one book on the internal arts that you should own. If you want to learn about Mr. Liang's theories on the internal arts, then I would suggest that you buy his book, not this one.

Unless you've got some personal connection to Mr. Liang or Mr. Olson, I'd recommend that you don't buy this book. And if you do, then maybe you can arrange for a proper biography to be written...

A wonderful and thoughtful book by the author on his master, T.T. Liang. Reminds me of my Shifu, Mr. Chiang, who also spent time studying with one of TT Liang's teachers, Hsiung Yang-Ho. I highly recommend this to all Taiji players out there, whether just starting out or a seasoned student/teacher.

The best internal arts book Ive ever read.no serious martial artist should be without this book.it will make you laugh cry and think. what more can you ask for in a martial art book.

My name is Valeria Messalina, Emperor Claudius' wife. I like to read modern studies on women in Classical Antiquity. As Latin is my first language, I find it easy to read Italian books... So I suppose you will understand me if I say that my favourite books are _Passato prossimo_ by Eva Cantarella and _Le sgualdrine impenitenti. Femminilità irregolare in Grecia e a Roma_ by Eleonora Cavallini. Please notice that miss Cavallini tells my _true_ story: I was a very very good girl, not a an _Augusta meretrix_ . Don't believe any malicious gossip about me!
_Donne e amore da Saffo ai tragici_ is a nice pamphlet, pleasant and reliable....but I don't care about such a boring, moralist woman as Sappho!

_donne e amore da Saffo ai tragici_ is an original essay, based on quotations from texts by Sappho, Alcauus, Pindar, Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. Women's condition appears to be quite different, if we consider the island of Lesbos in VI century or the polis of Athens in V.
An interesting historical survey about women's life and problems in ancient Greece.

I don't agree with those who said this book is "dated".
It is a little, delicious pamphlet about women in Greek lyric poetry and tragedy. A nice surview on women's life and problems as they are shown by Sappho, Pindar, Aeschylus and Euripides.
All Greek passages are translated into Italian. I think the translation is good...but I am German-speaking!I'd like to see a similar book in Austria.

(As I understand it) This book deals with chen forms used in competition. I must say it is quite different from the ch'en style I am learning. Same characteristic silk reeling energy, but in a different, less interesting form.

It's hard to find books on the Chen style. This one is well written and covers as much as you can expect in a book.

This is a kind of nothing book on tai chi and still it is everything there is.not a big book on tai chi and still a great book.meditation and AH! what a thing it is! And here is the book which combines tai chi and meditation.
A kind of book which has same kind of teaching of zen and tao like soundless sound and so on , so here it is meditation in motion.

This book is an often overlooked masterpiece on the subject of Tai chi chuan and meditation. Master Da Liu writes extensively on exercises from his own practice. Including coordination of qi circulation with the movements of the Yang Long Form. He also discusses the basics of Taoist meditation. A must for serious tai chi students.

I am sorry that I have to say this; Che Soo had very little knowledge of OUR chinese culture though he claimed he was taught by a chinese man called ---, all the materials in his book are, I suspect, made up by him or someone that they are very different from what I've learnt. Though I do not say that I know all but I have studied chinese literature and other chinese cultures for a very long time and I am still learning. Some of the stuffs really make me laugh.

This book is an excellent and profound insight into genuine taoist health arts, particularly the Lee Style's fluid form of Chi Kung energy activation - K'ai Men (open door.) The lengthy introduction is one of the clearest and most inspiring accounts of taoism in relation to the arts that I have read.

Professor Chee Soo's book on K'ai Men (Open Gate) Yoga is an extraordinary piece. It is the original book on the subject and covers all essential details of this unique Exercise Art. Prof. C. Chee Soo was the world's leading expert on this form: I should know I attended his Teacher's Training Classes. An amazing man with amazing skills and deep, deep knowledge of the Taoist Arts! This book is highly collectable, not for the money but for the knowledge within.

I've been taking T'ai Chi classes for several months and I bought this book hoping that it would supplement my instruction. I have an excellent teacher but there are so many elements to each movement that I thought it would help to have static images that I could examine at my leisure. I haven't found this book useful in that respect. The main problem is that it's not clear how the pictures relate to the written descriptions of the movements. Even for sections of the form that I know very well I am often unable to figure out which movement the pictures are trying to convey.

It is not possible for me to study Tai Chi with a master so I must relay on books and video tapes to learn the forms. The Tai Chi Workbook lacks sufficient graphic information about the postures and transitions to enable me to do this. McFarlan's book, while lacking the general information, does a much clearer job of demonstrating the form.

Paul Crompton's treatment of Master Cheng Man-Ch'ing's Tai Chi form is incredible, good illustrations and explanations, plus a realistic view of the art in self defense and philosophy. Crompton's work is to be commended.

When you are reading this book you fell like a man telling you things that you already know, nothing new. If you dont know nothing about AI maybe will help you.There is not algorithms on it, only obvious info. If you want to learn real AI buy "Artificial Inteligence" by Rich

The title of this book is its biggest flaw because it appears to cater to game programmers but the techniques described within it are not that useful. It appears that the book is marketed to the game programming community due to its immense size. Anybody interested it this book would be well advised to purchase the siggraph proceedings that it comes from because not only will you learn what this book is about, you will also have a large resource of other techniques that can be used for graphics and animation.

Yes, John's technique is interesting and different ... however he does not have a gaming background, has never worked on games, and it is obvious that this book is simply an extension of a research paper. You can find better resources for both AI and game programming elsewhere.

Computer Generated Imagery (CGI) has transformed the art of animation. Computer-generated characters are now an everyday part of contemporary culture from advertising to video games, from movies to the Internet. Artificial intelligences gives computer-generated characters the ability to react to their environment in logical ways. In most cases, a character is programmed to present a specific set of behaviors that allow it to interact with other characters or game players. But this approach also results in severe limitations on responses to a characters world and its behavior becomes too easily predictable.

In AI For Games And Animation: A Cognitive Modeling Approach, John Funge introduces a new approach for creating autonomous characters. Cognitive modeling provides computer-animated characters with logic, reasoning, and planning skills. Using this technique, an animator or programmer need only specify a behavior outline and, through reasoning, the character will automatically work out a detailed sequence of actions. AI For Games And Animation is an invaluable contribution to personal and professional CGI animation reference libraries.