Tai Ji Quan Master Wu Wenban

Tai Ji Quan Master Wu Wenban
    Destined to Learn Kung-Fu
    Mr. Wu Wenhan, styling himself Run Zhang, also call himself Liyang oldster. He was born in the 1920s , at Nanhe Town in Xingtai region, where Kung-fu such as Mei Hua Quan and Er Lang Quan was very popular. His grandfather actively took part in the one-year "anti-foreigner" movement at that time with his Kung-fu. His farther was a famous Mei Hua Quan boxer. Edificated by his family, Mr. Wu Wenhan began to learn and practise Kung-fu. He learnt Tai Ji Quan from Mr. Li Shengduan-a Muslim Tai Ji Quan magnate in Xingtai. From the popular fictions in the 1930s such as Stolen Boxing and Twelve Treasure Escort, he showed great respect to the Kung-fu masters like Yang Luchan. Apart from his teacher Li Shengduan, he visited almost all the Tai Ji Quan masters in Xingtai and Yongnian for advice. He was once instructed by some renowned masters such as Li Xiangyuan, Fan Shupu and Han Qinxian. Wu cleverly applied the comparative study technique to practising Tai Ji Quan, and consciously summed up and compared different schools of Chinese boxing, practice and teaching methods, which played an important role for his Tai Ji Quan research later.
    Orientation of Tai Ji Quan Study After Many Great Sufferings
    From 1949 to 1979, Wu underwent many sufferings and turned his life orientation several times. He once carried out Chinese literature study for nearly 10 years. He learnt to repair bicycles and shoes as a profession. He acted as a driver for some time. At last, he turned to study traditional Chinese medicine, and cured many patients. However, he gave up the traditional Chinese medicine after 1979, and took up his former career to study Tai Ji Quan with great concentration. Wu took cognizance of the potential social value of Tai Ji Quan during his study, and even successfully looked ahead to the potential international foreground of Tai Ji Quan. Whether or not useful for the nation and society becomes the cardinal principle for him to make a choice in study.
Not Became a Boxer But Kung-fu Researcher
    After retired, he studied Tai Ji Quan with great concentration and published a number of academic articles which sorted up his study results. With the historical dating research technique, he studied the occurrence and evolution of Tai Ji Quan in different political, economic and cultural backgrounds. He put the Tai Ji Quan to an academic height once again after two great Tai Ji Quan researchers-Mr. Xu Zhen and Mr. Tang Hao, and becomes an influential researcher and scholar of Tai Ji Quan. At the same time, he timely set forth important theories in terms of culture, philosophy and social science in allusion to connecting Tai Ji Quan with metaphysics and mysticism.
    Opposing Personality Cult and Apotheosis
In Wu's opinion, academic research cannot be separated with practice, and mystification and mysticism are disreputable. Academic research unbenefitial to practice will be washed outby history. Against some feudal appellations and organizations, he seriously expounded the origin and argument of some historical issues. He explicitly put it, difference in genre means difference in understanding of theory and different way of practising. He strongly opposes personal fetishism and apotheosis.
Exclusion of Faction in Talent Cultivation
    In Tai Ji Quan practice, though teaching was not Wu's original intention, he began to cultivate talent of "Wu" school of Tai Ji Quan by coincidence. He is quite different from others in teaching Tai Ji Quan. He is not confined by the old genre in narrow sense. He treats his own and other's disciples equally without discrimination. In recent years, Wu even more wakes up to the significance of talent cultivation. He believes that the primary cause for flourishing of "Yang" and "Chen" schools of Tai Ji Quan is talent issue. Where there are more talents, there are more practitioners, and vise versa, which could form a good circulation.
   Mr. Wu is a man of tremendous promise. Studying and workign for the revival and development of the State and nation is his lifetime pursuance. But the most respected thing for the aged scholar is that he could see how the land lies and do everything at his power in different historical periods. His research results in Tai Ji Quan, his successful experience in teaching and his encyclopedical knowledge influence many young people with ideal and gumption, and direct them on the way to study Tai Ji Quan and other academic fields for the benefit of the country.

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