Matthew PollyBruce Lee: A Life

I've been a Bruce Lee scholar as far back as I can remember. At various points in my life, he's played different roles: Childhood Hero, Martial Guru, Zen Mystic, Punk Rock Non Conformist, American Icon. As a child of the 70's/80's whose sole interests were Comic Books, Star Wars, Rocky Balboa and Bruce Lee, I have a deep reverence for mythology. As a martial practitioner of 33 years who's studied a fair amount of combative sciences, I have an equal need to rationalize and demythologize. These two approaches have governed my philosophy and views on nearly everything that grabs my attention.My initial introduction to Lee at the tender age of 6, was through a movie still. Captivated by his image, I sought out as many photos and stories as I could, getting my fix mostly through magazines and campfire lore. I would not actually see him in action til' a year later, in Game of Death 1978 (the opening 4 minutes and final 11 minutes of this film's effect on me is comparable to Saul's conversion to Paul). My lack of access to his movies at that time ( this was pre home cinema and smart phones), to me, reinforced his mythical status. Looking back, I'm inclined to believe that this was the genesis of my obsessive life long search for him. In the ensuing years, in addition to viewing his adult filmography repeatedly (with near religious fervor), I read every biography, watched every documentary and meticulously dissected whatever I could find on the man. Initially, I took pride in the 'facts' I'd gleaned, content in the basic beats of his story as well as what I discovered 'off script'. But following the honeymoon period(admittedly, a long one), stagnation set in, and I grew a bit disillusioned. What bothered me in particular was this: Bruce Lee's story, to me, had become, to quote Tarantino, "a game of show and tell. You're showing me everything, but telling me nothing". Paradoxically, the more I discovered, the less I felt I knew.One of the residual benefits of being a seeker, is the compulsive need to fill in gaps. To that end, I made the beat between the beats the focus of my Lee studies. Who was the man? What kept him up at night? What drove his insatiable need to be regarded as the best? Who were his heroes? How did he handle embarrassing moments in his life? Etc., etc. Some of those questions I found answers to. Some I'll never know. Upon reflection though, this quest to understand my idol was equally driven by the need to understand aspects of myself and, ultimately, liberate me from the grips of hero worship. Essentially, it was a gateway for me to come into my own. In my heart of hearts, my need to understand Bruce Lee was transformative. That's how much of an impact he had on me. I often mused about writing and producing a 'definitive' bio that presented him as a three dimensional human being - not the superhuman comic book character resurrected from the ashes, ipso facto. To be fair, I had spent a helluva lot of time with that dude, and, while I was grateful for his inspiration and indebted to him for starting me on my martial path, I needed time with the other guy (or the dude pretending to be the other dude). Enter Matthew Polly.Full disclosure: I had reached out to Matt a couple of years prior to the release of his book. My intent, at the time, was to qualify him as a biographer. What was his focus going to be? What was the tone was he going for? How granular was he going to get? Was it going to be a regurgitation of the same ol', same ol'? Ever the gentleman, he replied back and stated his intention in no unclear terms: his goal was to write the most complete biography on Bruce Lee, and hoped to present the man, as is, warts and all. I had heard this kind o' stuff before. And I was skeptical.Two years and 650 pages (actually 2,000+ which he whittled down) later, I'm thrilled to say that Matthew Polly has done the impossible. That is, he's chronicled and captured the intricacies of a complex man who's been deified in all things martial and worshipped by many as a superhuman force that's beyond understanding. It's difficult to overstate how difficult Matt's journey must have been wading through 45 years of mist and mire to reach the man behind the curtain. In doing so, he doesn't just write the definitive Bruce Lee biography, rather, he creates a work of intimate beauty truly worthy of it's subject matter. Equal parts character study, adventure story and forensic dissection, Polly's tome is a meditation on our very own 20th century Dorian Gray. With that, he succeeds in demythologizing the god, and celebrating the legend.Where to begin? The sheer wealth of information this opus has to offer (most of which I'm completely comfortable saying will be unknown to even the most die hard of fans) is only half of what truly makes it the monumental achievement it is. Equally as important are the revelations gleaned from the connective tissue that Polly seamlessly weaves into stories and anecdotes that most fans are familiar with, providing a broader perspective to those tales and giving them their proper context. Indeed, many folks will be surprised by the pieces missing from the stories they thought they knew. Additionally, the first 80 pages spend a significant amount of time tracing Lee's lineage and exploring his adolescent film career and life in Hong Kong (the first piece of writing to accurately do so) prior to coming back to the US in 1959. Moreover, we're given a historical overview of Hong Kong itself and the social environment that the young Bruce Lee came up in (the information here is paramount to understanding his 'origin'). For those who've heard the Frank Sinatra/Vic Damone rumor of Lee's impromptu Gung Fu demonstration on their bodyguards --the true story is finally revealed. Later, Polly gives us the first real information on Lee's little known "Northern Leg, Southern Fist" script treatment. Most fans know that Lee was a pretty good pencil artist, but are they aware of what specific art he admired and may have harbored a desire to pursue himself? Yet another: what was the timeline of July 20th, 1973 and what were the contributing factors that led to Lee's death? The answers are all laid out, hour by hour, and supported by those involved in distinctly quantifiable ways. All this and much more is relayed to the reader in a deeply resonant and visceral way that defies category. Indeed, the emotional connection is so riveting that, when reading each page, one feels they are there, alongside Lee, in his head, experiencing his very thoughts and emotions. It's a level of intimacy rarely achieved in writing, let alone a bio.There's a distinct difference between a subject matter expert and a substance matter expert. Subject matter experts memorize other people's information, while substance matter experts understand the skeleton and mechanics of the subject and impart what they learned, not what they memorized. With this work of art, Matt Polly proves himself to be a true substance matter expert whose keen attention to detail reveals exactly how much of a labor of love this project was to him. Like many of us, Matt's life was forever changed by Bruce Lee. On more than one occasion, he's intimated that writing this book was his way of paying back that debt to his childhood idol.He succeeded. Boy, did he.Thank you Matt, for giving us this much needed, long overdue gift. In a very real way, you've produced the book I wish I'd written.

I’ve been an avid Bruce Lee fan and martial arts enthusiast for quite sometime, read all his books including Tao of Jeet Kune Do and watched great documentaries about his life A Warrior’s Journey and Bruce Lee: The Man & The Legend. This book from Matthew Polly does not explore much on Bruce’s martial art accomplishments but provides old sensational accounts of Bruce Lee affairs, abuse, drug addiction, challenged fights and struggles with fame that were reported before in other biographical works and HK media. There is nothing really new to take away other than the speculation about Bruce Lee’s cause of death, Polly theorizes without any medical, forensic or scientific evidence that his cerebra edema at the time of death was caused by a heat stroke. He does not reveal the real reason why the inquest to his death turned out to be death by misadventure. The fact of the matter is, the inquest was greatly influenced by the government's strategy to conceal the true about exposing one of his outstanding citizens cannabis use (at the time people who consumed it would’ve been imprisoned) and the urgency to win the life insurance claim brought by the family. In January 1973, Bruce Lee had taken out a policy for $500,000. If American International Assurance could prove that he had lied when he stated on the application that he had never used illegal drugs or if it could prove that he had died as a result of using illegal drugs, the widow and her children would be deprived of their insurance benefits.The government of Hong Kong never saw Bruce Lee as a real Chinese back then, and it was clear that by the time of his death they wanted to avoid another scandal during the inquest after it was initially reported that he passed away at Linda's house. No wonder why Hong Kong has no Bruce Lee museum, no Bruce Lee Boulevard, not even a proper Bruce Lee memorial. The city’s Avenue of Stars, Hong Kong’s version of the Hollywood Walk of Fame, features a lone statue of the star, but its erection was the result of a global fan initiative, not the local government’s largesse.Thanks to the latest advances in forensic technology it has now been revealed that Bruce Lee's health deteriorated due to his over use of the steroid cortisone. Bruce had an innate obsession from early age to prove himself as a man due to his cryptorchidism condition (undescended testicle). His constant and relentless physical regimen led him to slipped one of his back discs while working out in 1970, and because of the severe pain suffered he started taking cortisone to get some relieve. By the time of his death he had have a three year period of cortisone intake, he developed all the symptoms, bad temper, extreme body heat, poor appetite, heart condition, loss of breath, loss of memory, nervousness( who he sporadically controlled with the cannabis he consumed) redness in his face and loss of weight and stress. For a Man as extreme as trained, altogether took it's tall, causing his untimely and unfortunate death.In the end is important to remember how Bruce Lee lived his life through his many accomplishments and not the way he died.

Exhaustively researched and deeply thorough, Matthew Polly's biography of martial arts and film icon Bruce Lee is easily the most authoritative book on the late star. Including interviews with those who knew Lee best and a number of rare photographs not seen before, Polly's book covers his life from birth, to death, to his legacy, and everything in between.Usually, this kind of depth comes only with authorized biographies - an exchange of access to personal material in exchange for approval of an author's content. That is not the case here; for while Polly has treated Bruce Lee with respect and does not shy away from the tremendous impact he had on both film and martial arts, this is no hagiography under the control of Lee's estate. Bruce Lee's fiery temper, his occasional philandering, his drug use, and his youth as a genuine delinquent are examined factually, with neither salaciousness nor dismissiveness.The result is a three-dimensional portrait of one of the 20th century's most compelling figures; an imperfect man who nearly wasted himself before harnessing his bottomless drive and determination to turn his otherwordly physical skills into a force for change. At more than 400 pages with an additional 130-plus of notes, however, this is not a casual read for casual fans. For those who want to learn more about a man who was a pioneering martial artist, who almost single-handedly brought Asian action films to the West, and who made a lasting impact on martial arts instruction around the world, the reader won't do better than "Bruce Lee: A Life".

I found this to be underwhelming to be honest...I suppose that comes with plenty of written word already out there....what can a new bio really come up with? More interviews with the same people saying the same things? I found some of the perceived conversations that took place between Bruce and others that Polly practically quotes to be rather strange...how did he know they said THAT? ........I found Bruce Thomas’ bio far superior to this (Mr Polly rather churlishly mentions a bio written by “the bass player in Fleetwood Mac”) so if you haven’t read Fighting Spirit I’d go with that instead....

This is a really well-written, well-researched and referenced book that gives it a sense of academic credibility. As mentioned, it’s a long book, but I really couldn’t put it down and looked forward to my bedtime meeting with it’s pages.I bought this try and understand the huge hype that surrounds the man, his films and his writings. After reading this account, I personally didn’t find him a likeable character being rather childish and on referring to my copy of DSM-5, possibly suffering from narcissistic personality disorder since he displayed many of the symptoms which can easily be looked up online. Working down that list, he was dismissive of other arts (the classical Kung fu master, Karate etc) thus aggrandising his own abilities, his open conversational gambit was often, “Feel my muscles” or “Attack me in any way” trying to garner admiration, he suggested his art was the best without really proving it except in a few exchanges with carefully chosen opponents, he would have ideas beyond normal motivations such as his written ‘Aims’, he was obsessed with achieving more than is seniors like McQueen and Coburn just to better them rather than to achieve something and push the acting profession to new heights. Hen belittled other martial artists, actors, writers, directors who he felt were a challenge to his ‘superior’ ideas, he had numerous affairs even telling his wife that if she ever found out he was sleeping with other women, it was only for the sex so it was acceptable because he loved her and the kids! I could go on, but you get the idea. What we’re left with as a legacy are four pretty awful films: ‘Enter the Dragon’ is passable, with his terrible over-acting and cringe-worthy dialogues about things like ‘fingers pointing at the moon’ levered awkwardly into narrative (remember, in the same year we had American Graffiti, The Day of the Jackal, The Exorcist, Papillion, Serpico, The Sting, The Wickerman etc so Lee’s films can’t be said to be ‘of their time’), derivative philosophy books with nothing new or innovative at all and a martial art that nobody else appears to be able to be anywhere near as proficient in as the founder was, suggesting it wasn’t a ‘system’ but a personal, albeit extraordinary, ability on the part of Lee. Reading about the sleazy circumstances surrounding his death made me feel unclean: he had been having sex with his mistress all afternoon, unprofessionally cancelling the meeting with a potential famous acting collaborator who had flown into Hong Kong specially to meet Lee, he’d taken recreational drugs and then, rather childishly exhausted himself by showing off (recreating all fight scenes from Game of Death) to his mistress. The author suggests this exercise, on the hottest day of that year, may have been the major contributory factor in his death.In the light of this, it is a credit to his family, the PR companies and film studios that they have managed to create and perpetuate this wholesome, deeply spiritual image of the man that was Bruce Lee, attributes doesn’t seem to have possessed.This is a fantastic book, buy and read it now!

I was a Bruce Lee fan from being a young lad and through to my early adulthood. Now in my 40s, I stumbled across this while browsing Amazon and had to have it. It is an absolutely fantastic read for a Bruce Lee fan. I never knew a fraction of the information in this book until now.

Great insight to the life of this legend, meticulously researched and very easy to read and it quickly draws you in to Bruce’s life and shows what a complex and driven man he was. It dispels a number of conspiracy theories surrounding his untimely death, the book comes in at just under 500 pages and another 200 on research notes and bibliography. I can highly recommend this book.

I must say I really enjoyed this book. It is a lot like the Bruce Thomas book Fighting Spirit but with a bit more added detail. It has a few mistakes throughout like a pic of Bruce vs Bob Baker from Fist of Fury but the caption says that it’s Bob Wall which is a mistake. Also a few annoying spelling mistakes but I can live with that as the book is filled with lots of new info about Bruce’s life. All in all an enjoyable read so I give it a solid 9.5 out of 10. 👍. If your read this book & The Beice Thomas book called Fighting Spirit then that’s all you’ll ever need to read about the life of the great Bruce Lee.