From Eric Tuttle: I travelled to Shanghai, China in the late 1990s and met this author when he was about 85 years of age, finding him to be in excellent health. Because we were from the same Chen ZhaoKui family of practice, he and his students were kind and open with me, which left a deep impression. I share now a translation of his article for his insights into his experiences with, and the training and practice of, Chen Zhaokui:
A Few Things About Chen ZhaoKui by Wan WenDe
Taijiquan comes down to us from the Chen Family 9th Generation patriarch Chen WangTing who, within the circles of Chinese martial arts, is recognized as having great accomplishment, but was not the full peak of taijiquan. At the time of the 14th generation’s Chen ChangXing, Chen style taijiquan really began to spread (in fame etc). He has been nicknamed/styled “The Memorial Tablet” due to his great accuracy and skill in practice, and was truly the Master of a Generation. It is known that he passed his lesser art into the hands of Yang LuChan, who passed it to many others in time and became famous in his own right. Many would not have believed such skill as his was possible, and not every generation can be said to have such a genius. At the time of 17th Generation’s Chen FaKe, who was Chen ZhaoKui’s father, we see two peaks on the same mountain. Chen FaKe had a great influence on the martial arts community of Beijing and the surrounding area, and Chen ZhaoKui was greatly influential in the south; both father and son were skilled, and knowledge passed easily between them; but it was not just words, it was also hard bitter training. Chen ZhaoKui is known to have practiced up to 20 boxing sets daily, becoming greatly skilled in the process. His movements and practice demonstrate the profound mysteries of taijiquan, its many flavours, and its benefits. With respect to martial arts, one cannot help but admire him and stare silently; even easily-distracted kids would focus at it;
His performance of movement had a special charm. My experience is: training taijiquan with him, it wouldn’t matter how long it went on, one would not feel exhausted/tired; I remember once in 1965, there was a period of time when every Tuesday and Thursday morning he would call me to join his students at the home of one of them to train boxing. That classmate had a very big house, and in the main hall we would practice First form 3 times, and Second form twice; the postures were deep, but I was not tired out afterwards; Gu LiuXing wanted to join each time, and watched us train in this way, never arriving late, waiting for us to complete our training before leaving, never uttering a word;
Master Chen’s shaking movements were like a lion shaking its mane, and the same in intensity; Those without many years of training or experience would not be able to understand or replicate it; in 1963, he opened a class in the local gym, where a man called Dong ShiZuo was claiming skill with Empty Force, being able to knock others down without touching them, and he came to participate in the class; Master Chen allowed him to come forward and take a stable horse stance; then had another student, Jie ShiFei, leaning against Dong on the other side; Master Chen used a shaking fa jing movement and moved both of them a short distance away; because they had good basic taijiquan skills, they did not fall down, but both said “How cool, How cool!” After that, Dong gave up on Empty Force ideas and training.
Every Sunday, Master Chen had no classes, so myself and a few others would ask Master Chen to come to PengPu Park to teach us a few skills; my neighbour was Mr Guan, who was training Yang style Taijiquan with Master Tian ZhaoLin. One time, he pushed hands with Master Chen; he tried to take advantage of Master Chen before he was prepared to begin by leaning in to hit/bump him; Master Chen made a small shaking movement, and Mr Guan was thrown out and onto the ground, and spent about 2 weeks nursing his injury thereafter.
At the gym, Master Chen opened a class for qin na skills/practice; Chen style qin na skills include controlling the wrist joints, elbow joints, and the shoulder joints, and the importance of these three areas; As far as I know, Master Chen was famous for his qin na skills; when he seized someone, there was nothing they could do – one touch and it was over; if you didn’t kneel, he didn’t let go; when he released you, even if he gave you a single finger, allowing you to use even two hands to control it, he could not be taken, and he was able to escape easily; he was also easily able to perform reversals, which we watched and learned over time; his dissolving skills were also distinct; he specialized in applying the ideas of Chinese medicine to his skills; At that time in Shanghai there was a certain highly-ranked competitive strongman/bodybuilder who also trained at the gym; Master Chen allowed him to try his skills, and even with his great strength he was easily controlled and dissolved by Master Chen.
During the 70s and 80s there was a phys ed manager who loved taijiquan, Gu LiuXing, who frequently invited Taijiquan teachers to the gym, and at his gym there were also some Shaolin class instructors. Even though there was Taijiquan and Shaolin in one place, they did not well understand each other, because of their reluctance to interact. Master Chen ZhaoKui, because he did not fear losing to others and would accept all challengers, was the only one who crossed hands with them, and was greatly respected for it.