PREFACE
Reading edition
The accompanying brief text originated in the failure, when called upon to coach the fencing team at the University of Kentucky several years ago, to find any book on the subject that seemed to sufficiently emphasize some of the basic principles of French Foil play. With books adequately presenting both the Italian and compromise schools, we felt that a brief presentation of the theory of the French school would not be amiss.
It has seemed to us that this tendency to follow a compromise school without any effort to explain or insist upon the basic theory and practice of either French or Italian method, will develop a group of sword fighters whose progress is limited by their personal ability and originality along irregular lines rather than by the almost limitless possibilities of either of the classical schools. Certainly a fencer thoroughly grounded in the basic philosophy and technique of either of these schools is better prepared for a long course of steady improvement than the individual who has a rather vague conception of the purpose and performance of offense and defense with the sword.
Therefore, we have endeavored to present accurately and with reasonable thoroughness the basic principles of the French school. We have tried to indicate the practical application of these principles to competition fencing and to point out a number of the pit falls that await the unwary.
There are four groups to whom it is hoped that this little book will prove of special value: (1) the amateur fencer whose past interest has been in the practice rather than in the theory of the art, but who has been drafted as coach in one of the colleges that has no available professional; (2) the instructor in the Department of Physical Education who, with only a minimum of personal knowledge, is called upon for class instruction; (3) the amateur fencer who has become somewhat vague in his memory of theory, rules, and conventions, but finds that he is to be called upon to act as an official in local fencing matches; and (4) the young fencer who must either give up fencing or find his way as best he may without the advantages of personal instruction.