Be formless ... shapeless, like water. Happy Birthday Lee Jun-fan! Better known as Bruce Lee. WAA! Meoooooow! Born in the year of the dragon (1940), at the hour of the dragon (between 6:00AM- 8:00AM) d. 1973 One of the most influential martial artists of all time and a pop culture icon of the 20th century. He is often credited with helping to change the way Asians were presented in American films. Absorb what is useful, Discard what is not, Add what is uniquely your own. Noted for his roles in five feature-length films: Lo Weis The Big Boss (1971) and Fist of Fury (1972); Way of the Dragon (1972), directed and written by Lee; Warner Brothers Enter the Dragon (1973) and The Game of Death (1973), both directed by Robert Clouse. And on television as Kato, sidekick to the Green Hornet in the 1960s Batman inspired series as well as appearances on Ironside and Longstreet. Initially trained in Wing Chun, but later rejected well-defined martial art styles, favoring instead the use of techniques from various sources, in the spirit of his personal martial arts philosophy, which he dubbed Jeet Kune Do (The Way of the Intercepting Fist). To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person. If you want to understand the truth in martial arts, to see any opponent clearly, you must throw away the notion of styles or schools, prejudices, likes and dislikes, and so forth. Then, your mind will cease all conflict and come to rest. In this silence, you will see totally and freshly. Lee was born in Chinatown, San Francisco to parents from Hong Kong and was raised in Kowloon with his family until his late teens. He was introduced to the film industry by his father and appeared in several films as a child actor. Lee moved to the United States at the age of 18 to receive his higher education, and it was during this time that he began teaching martial arts. Dont think, feel! It is like a finger pointing away to the moon. Dont concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory. Lee began training in Wing Chun at the age of 13 under the Wing Chun teacher Yip Man in 1954, after losing a fight with rival gang members. Yips regular classes generally consisted of the forms practice, chi sao (sticking hands) drills, wooden dummy techniques, and free-sparring. There was no set pattern to the classes. Yip tried to keep his students from fighting in the street gangs of Hong Kong by encouraging them to fight in organized competitions. After a year into his Wing Chun training, most of Yip Mans other students refused to train with Lee after they learned of his mixed ancestry, as the Chinese were generally against teaching their martial arts techniques to non-Asians. His father is a full-blooded Chinese, while his mother is of German -Chinese decent. Was an accomplished dancer and Hong Kong cha cha cha champion. Lee began teaching martial arts in the United States in 1959. He called what he taught Jun Fan Gung Fu (literally Bruce Lees Kung Fu). It was basically his approach to Wing Chun. Defeated British boxer Gary Elms by knockout in the third round in the 1958 Hong Kong amateur boxing championships by using Wing Chun traps and high/low-level straight punches. Before he met Elms in the finals, he knocked out three boxers in the first round. Hawkings Cheung, his fellow Wing Chun street fighter, witnessed the event. Lee knocked-out Chung, a Choy Li Fut fighter, in Hong Kong in a 1958 Full-Contact match. In 1961, while studying philosophy, psychology, and various other subjects at the University of Washington that he met his future wife Linda Emery, a fellow student studying to become a teacher, whom he married in August 1964. They had two children, Brandon Lee (1965–93) and Shannon Walsh Lee (born 1969). Lee knocked out Uechi in 10 seconds in a 1962 Full-Contact match in Seattle. At the 1964 Long Beach International Karate Championships he demonstrated his two-finger push-ups, one inch punch and his unstoppable punch. Lee knocked out Wong Jack-Man in Oakland, CA, in a 1965 no-holds-barred challenge match. It was Lees last official fight. It lasted three minutes. When an opportunity in a fight presents itself, I dont hit, it hits all by itself. His development of Jeet Kune Do came partially out of an incident with his school. A rival martial artist challenged him to a duel over his decision to teach non-Chinese students. Lee accepted the challenge and won the duel but later thought that the fight took too long because his martial art technique was too rigid and formalistic. Thus he decided to develop a better system with an emphasis on practicality and flexibility. A goal is not always meant to be reached; it often serves simply as something to aim at. In Jeet Kune Do, Lee emphasized what he called the style of no style. This consisted of getting rid of the formalized approach which Lee claimed was indicative of traditional styles. He included all elements of total fitness—muscular strength, muscular endurance, cardiovascular endurance, flexibility and nutrition. His students in Jeet Kune Do martial arts included Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Steve McQueen, James Coburn and Hollywood script writer Stirling Silliphant . He charged up to $275 per hour. Often trained to the Mission: Impossible theme. Developed a trick for showing off his speed: a person held a coin and closed his hand and, as he closed it, Lee would take it and could even swap the coin for another. In 1971, Lee pitched a television series of his own titled The Warrior. Retooled and renamed Kung Fu. Lee was not cast was in part because of his ethnicity, but more so because he had a thick accent. The role of the Shaolin monk in the Wild West, was awarded to then-non-martial-artist David Carradine. Lee stated he understood Warner Brothers attitudes towards casting in the series: They think that business wise it is a risk. I dont blame them. If the situation were reversed, and an American star were to come to Hong Kong, and I was the man with the money, I would have my own concerns as to whether the acceptance would be there. According to Hong Kong stuntman Phillip Ko, Lee was challenged by a tiger/crane kung fu stylist, an extra on Enter the Dragon (1973), who claimed Lee was a phony. Lee, who was furious at the claim, accepted the challenge to prove that his martial arts were indeed the real deal. The fight, which took place on the film set, only lasted 30 seconds, with Bruce pummeling his challenger with a series of straight punches to the face, low-line kicks to his shins/knees/thighs and finally ended with the guy being smashed to the wall with his hair pulled and his arms trapped by Bruce. After Lee forced the kung fu stylist to submit, he showed some class by telling him to go back to work instead of firing him. This fight was witnessed by the films producer, Fred Weintraub, and Robert Wall. On 20 July 1973, Lee was in Hong Kong, to have dinner with James Bond star George Lazenby, with whom he intended to make a film. According to Lees wife Linda, Lee met producer Raymond Chow at 2 pm at home to discuss the making of the film Game of Death. They worked until 4 pm and then drove together to the home of Lees colleague Betty Ting Pei, a Taiwanese actress. The three went over the script at Tings home, and then Chow left to attend a dinner meeting. Later Lee complained of a headache, and Ting gave him an analgesic (painkiller), Equagesic, which contained both aspirin and the muscle relaxant meprobamate. Around 7:30 pm, he went to lie down for a nap. When Lee did not turn up for dinner, Chow came to the apartment but could not wake Lee up. A doctor was summoned, who spent ten minutes attempting to revive him before sending him by ambulance to Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Lee was dead by the time he reached the hospital.[79] There was no visible external injury; however, according to autopsy reports, his brain had swollen considerably, from 1,400 to 1,575 grams (a 13% increase). Lee was 32 years old. The only substance found during the autopsy was Equagesic. On 15 October 2005, Chow stated in an interview that Lee died from an allergic reaction to the muscle relaxant (meprobamate) in Equagesic, which he described as a common ingredient in painkillers. The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering. When Elvis Presleys and Ed Parkers unfinished martial arts film New Gladiators was found in 2003, there was 20 minutes of Lees demonstration at a martial arts display in the mid-60s found along with it. If you always put limits on what you can do, physical or anything else, itll spread over into the rest of your life. Itll spread over into your work, into your mortality, into your entire being. There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you.
Posted on: Wed, 27 Nov 2013 17:45:36 +0000
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