Hi!

I hope this finds you well. I’m cracking on with writing the new dagger book, From Medieval Manuscript to Modern Practice: the Dagger Techniques of Fiore dei Liberi. I already have all of the transcription, translation, and video clips done, so I’m now bashing the book into shape around them. It’s the sort of grunt writing work that is relatively straightforward, just very labour intensive.

I’m also updating all of the video clips that go with From Medieval Manuscript to Modern Practice the Longsword Techniques of Fiore dei Liberi. I shot every play with Jessica Finley in Kansas in July, and am just now getting them edited. This is just an upgrade to the existing book, and I’ll also add the clips to the existing Medieval Longsword Course

And I’m happy to report that Jessica’s Von Bauman’s manuscript Twirch Ringen wrestling course is almost ready. So my days are filled with endless video clip editing. It’s one of those things that I can’t outsource because who else is qualified to say which of the many takes is the best one?

I’m keeping up with my physical training, never fear. I even wrote up a lengthy description of the physio, strength, cardio and other training I’m currently doing. I was going to put it on my blog, but it got into some fairly personal territory, and I felt more comfortable posting it on Sword People. Because all the comments are helpful and supportive. You can find it at swordpeople.com, in the “training and conditioning” space.

If Bolognese fencing is your thing, then you should check out Esko Ronimus’s new course: Introduction to Bolognese Swordsmanship: dall’Agocchie's Varying Guards Form. Use the code BOLOGNESE40 get a 40% discount until November 30th. Which happens to be my 51st birthday, so you may be holding out for the traditional Guy’s Birthday Sale. Which will happen (expect an email on the 28th), but I’m compelled to inform you that it won’t beat the current discount on Esko’s course. So get it while you can!

Cool stuff from the internet

My friend Dave Smith (whom you may recognise from my I.33 Sword and Buckler course) kindly let me know about a treasure-trove of fencing treatises: the famous Corble collection has been properly digitised and put online here:

​https://kuleuven.limo.libis.be/discovery/collectionDiscovery?vid=32KUL_KUL:KULeuven&inst=32KUL_KUL&collectionId=81531735820001488​

It includes all kinds of things, including sabre treatises in Spanish, and Saviolo’s His Practice right next to Silver’s Paradoxes of Defence, and a whole bunch of other cool stuff.

And Joshua Wiest has been at it again, finding out really interesting context on historical fencing authors, in this case the vitally important Angelo Viggiani. You can read all about it on his substack here! https://open.substack.com/pub/theartofarms/p/angelo-viggiani-del-montone​

This week on the podcast: Why Guy needs a pie in the face, with Sydney Schwindt

Sydney Schwindt is an actor, fight director and clown. She is also an artist and illustrator.

In our conversation, we talk about how Sydney got into fight direction and some of the plays Sydney has worked on, or would like to work on and the swords she enjoys using.

We also talk about being a clown, and the joy of having the audience throw a pie in your face. This leads us into a discussion about some of Shakespeare’s clowns and how they have been portrayed on film by different actors, more or less successfully.

Sydney has a website for her art, called True Edge Art, and we talk about some of her designs and what inspires her. A big part of her inspiration in both her visual art and her stage work is environmentalism, and she is keen to do more work making the violence of climate change feel more real and more visceral by embodying it through actual violence on stage.

And she’s also going to do a one-person show about a clown raccoon.

What I’m reading

I was visiting a friend a while ago and ran out of book, so borrowed one I saw sitting on a shelf. The Maid, by Nita Prose. This is a charming whodunnit, with a quirky first-person narrator who you’ll either love or hate. I really liked her. Be warned, the book may incite cleaning OCD tendencies.

My friend Mark Teppo is featured in a new collection of short stories edited by the legendary Jessie Kwak. Crooked v3 is actually free on all platforms as an ebook. This kind of anthology is designed to showcase a bunch of writers, on the assumption that if you like their short story, you’ll subscribe to their mailing lists, buy their work, and so on. In fact, Crooked V1 and 2 are also free, so you may as well get the lot. And Mark’s contribution to each actually follow on from each other, so it’s best to start at the beginning. If you like sci-fi, and stuff blowing up, and actual fun, then find these anthologies wherever you get your ebooks from. Or buy the paperbacks, that works too.

cheers,

Guy