Karate-dō

This text presents the autobiography of the man who made karate an international martial art, in which he recalls his own teachers and of his efforts to define and spread knowledge about karate without compromising its spirit. Linking the time when karate was a strictly Okinawan art of self-defense shrouded in the deepest secrecy and the present day, when it has become a martial art practiced throughout the world, is Gichin Funakoshi, the Father of Karate-do.' Out of modesty, he was reluctant to write this autobiography and did not do so until he was'