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Acknowledgments Many people have contributed to the preparation of this book. Along with Professor Hakeda, who first inspired me to take up Takuan and taught me the theory of “no fixed mind,” and Charlie, who taught me its practical application , I owe a special debt of gratitude to Ryuichi Abe, Edwin O. Reischauer Institute Professor of Japanese Religions in Harvard University’s Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations. A fellow graduate student under Professor Hakeda, Professor Abe has generously shared with me his wisdom and expertise, helping with countless questions that arose in the course of the translation and associated research. Maria Collora, Michael Hotz, and John Storm read the manuscript through at various stages, offering many helpful suggestions, while Peeter Lamp and Ian Chandler were always ready to untangle ticklish computer-related problems . Hiroaki Sato kindly made available his personal copy of Yagyū Munenori’s Heihō kadensho, and Haruo Watabe helped procure Japanese print and internet materials relating to Munenori and the New Shadow school. Haruo also arranged for me to visit the New York City New Shadow school dojo, where I was able to observe American men and women, armed with both wooden and “live” swords, training in the time-honored traditions of the Yagyū school. My sincere gratitude to the current head of the school, Yagyū Koichi, and to Hamada sensei of the New York Yagyū-kai. For information on the Baize and its connections with Chinese Zen, I am indebted to Professor Don Harper of the University of Chicago, who kindly shared with me portions of the research for his forthcoming book on occult texts and popular culture in China from the fourth century BCE to the tenth century CE. I was also unusually fortunate in my peer review reader for the manuscript, who had a compendious knowledge of not only Takuan and his writings but the history of Japanese swordsmanship in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and directed me to a wide variety of sources and issues that otherwise might have been overlooked. While academic publishing protocol prevents me from knowing the reader’s identity, I am very much indebted to his many apt and detailed suggestions, which contributed greatly to the introductory portion of the work. Thanks also to my editor at University of Hawai‘i Press, Patricia Crosby, for once again finding such skilled readers and for her seemingly endless patience in seeing the book through to completion, and to Susan Stone, the press’s copy editor extraordinaire. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the First Zen Institute of America for graciously making available to me its library and computer facilities, and Sachie Noguchi, Kenneth Harlin, D. John McClure, Chengzhi Wang, and the other staff members of Columbia University’s Starr East Asian Library for their help over the course of the present project. xiv Acknowledgments ...

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