"Wolfe Lowenthal's quiet little memoir will with window-opening wisdom reinforce, I think, my view of how Cheng stood on Tai Chi. It tells how a young writer reacted to this strance Chinese man when he appeared in New York City in the mid-1960's and stayed there for a decade before returning to Taiwan to die in 1975. In a nickel town where neurosis is a cardinal virtue, the Tai Chi center established by Cheng soon became an oasis of learning. In my visits there I was invariably approached by a quiet fellow with a ready smile and loads of questions. His form and sensing hands improved but he never lost his kindly ways. This lead me once to tell the three seniors that the one person in the club who best exemplified Tai Chi was this junior. That man who has since become a teacher of the art is the author of this book." Robert W. Smith (from the Preface)
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"Students of the Professor thought a lot about 'getting it.' 'When am I going to get it - has he got more that I?' The old man fostered this materialistic, non-Taoist attitude. A paradox of the Professor was that combined with his softness was an intensely competitive streak. He would make a competition out of anything. I recall him once sitting at his desk with a student who was a professional guitarist; they were pressing the tips of their fingernails together to see which would nick the other. A test of who had the most ch'i in his fingers. Needles to say who won.
"What was this 'It' that we were supposed to be getting and were so far away from?
"...The general implication was that if 'It' was not an overtly martial quality, it definitely had to do with the power of Tai Chi Chuan. 'The difference between yoga and Tai Chi,' he once said, 'is that even if you get it studying yoga, there's nothing you can do if someone tries to knock you off your cushion.'" Wolfe Lowenthal (from the book)

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