The Whirling Circles of Ba Gua Zhang: The Art and Legends of the Eight Trigram Palm

by Frank Allen, Tina Chunna Zhang

This is the most complete book on the art of Ba Gua Zhang ever presented in English. It tells the story of the history and legends of the art and its most famous masters as well as presenting the basic training, forms, fighting and weapons of Ba Gua Zhang. The text also includes a new translation of the classic Ba Gua 36 songs and 48 Methods as well as the Daoist meditation roots of the art and the method in which Ba Gua becomes at its ultimate level a physical and energetic manifestation of the Chinese Classic of Change, the Yi Jing. This book will be of interest not only to practitioners and enthusiasts of Ba Gua Zhang, but also to everyone who is interested in the history, philosophy and methods of Chinese Internal Martial Arts.

Genres: Martial Arts

248 pages, Paperback

First published June 26, 2007

Reviews

[Wetmarble · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall a decent book. A very nice section on the history of some of the more famous practitioners and a new translation of the 36 songs and 48 methods. The rest left something to be desired. There are nice detailed descriptions with photos of the forms, but very poor treatment as to the applications of the forms.

It's definitely worth having for the songs and methods, however, unless you are a cheng practitioner, you probably will not get much more out of this book.

[Lewis Manalo · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best martial arts manuals of recent years, Whirling Circles is a great introduction to baguazhang. The writing style is concise and straightforward, a rarity of the genre, and though the book's production design is not so big budget as the many MMA manuals that have come out recently, the photographs clearly illustrate the forms and the few techniques the book covers.

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

OK book from Bruce Frantzis student. I don't really know enough Bagua to criticize or praise his technique. Was looking for a little more basics and structure.

[Ran]

if it's good enough for Aang, that's good enough for me!