The Big Book On Fencing  By Rudy Volkmann

“You can’t learn to fence from a book, but you can learn significant things about
fencing.” Written for the average American fencer, this 271-page text has gotten “must
buy” reviews from the British and Dutch fencing federations as well as by the current
president of the American Fencing Coaches Association (the USFA does not review
fencing texts). Included are sections on history pedagogy, tactics, directing, repair (Dr.
Volkmann’s celebrated repair manual is one of the sections), and the plans for a fencing
dummy. The main part of the text, though, is a highly illustrated encylopedia of all the
moves used in foil fencing, which includes the theorgies behind the moves and positions,
and detailed explanations of what goes wrong when trying to learn them. Just the section
on stance, advance, retreat, lunge, and recovery types take over thirty detailed pages.