Swords in the Time of Corona

by Guy Windsor

When this coronavirus, SARS-CoV-19, emerged at the beginning of 2020, I didn’t worry too much about it, because I recognised it as being outside my area of control. There was nothing for me to do, so I just ignored it. Then bit by bit things started to change—the twin threats of death by plague and economic ruin came front and center into our collective awareness. As lockdown progressed it was soon obvious that many of my students were struggling. Things they depended on for their physical, mental, and economic health were simply gone. I realised that I had to focus on my core mission, which is to help my students. Normally, that means help them with their sword problems, but the whole point of practising swordsmanship is to improve your quality of life. And not all the help they needed was directly sword related. Then I thought of the things that were working for the mental postures learned from swordsmanship training, that were easing my way through lockdown with minimal stress. I started blogging these ideas as they came up, between March and June 2020, and before long was getting requests from readers to create a book of them. So here it is. Guy’s Lockdown Survival Guide, or, Swords in the Time of Corona. Some of the advice here is lockdown-specific, but most of it is applicable to all sorts of crises. I hope you find it useful.

47 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 4, 2021

About the author

Dr. Guy Windsor is a world-renowned instructor and a pioneering researcher of medieval and renaissance martial arts. He has been teaching the Art of Arms full-time since founding The School of European Swordsmanship in Helsinki, Finland, in 2001. His day job is finding and analysing historical swordsmanship treatises, figuring out the systems they represent, creating a syllabus from the treatises for his students to train with, and teaching the system to his students all over the world. Guy is the author of numerous classic books about the art of swordsmanship and has consulted on swordfighting game design and stage combat. He developed the card game, Audatia, based on Fiore dei Liberi's Art of Arms, his primary field of study. In 2018 Edinburgh University awarded him a PhD by Research Publications for his work recreating historical combat systems. When not studying medieval and renaissance swordsmanship or writing books Guy can be found in his shed woodworking or spending time with his family.