Aikido MastersPranin, Stanley [ed]. Aiki News, 1993 310pp.

Stanley Pranin is the editor of Aiki News [now internet based Aikido Journal]. Aikido Masters is a set of interviews conducted by Pranin over an 18 year period. There are 14 individual interviews with many of the leading students of O Sensei form the prewar years of aikido. The individuals interviewed include: Noriaki Inoue, Kenji Tomiki, Hisao Kamada, Ikkusai Iwata, Minoru Mochizuki, Shigemi Yonekawa, Rinjiro Shirata, Gozo Shioda, Yoshio Sugino, Kiyoshi Nakakura, Takako Kunigoshi, Zenzaburo Akazawa, Tenryu and Kisshomaru Ueshiba.

While naturally each individual interviewed will present events with the errors of memory 40 or 50 years on never-the-less the interviews build into an invaluable first hand record of O Sensei and seminal aikido events around the time when aikido was born. Many of the individuals went on to become influential in aikido providing direction from the prewar years to today. Many of those interviewed have now have passed on and this is one of the best records available of their input to aikido.

Aikido Masters is a fascinating historical record. To date Pranin has not produced Volume 2 but we hope he will continue with this project. A must read.