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Light on Yoga
Light on Yoga: Yoga Dipika (Sanskrit: योग दीपिका, "Yoga Dīpikā") is a 1966 book on the Iyengar Yoga style of modern yoga as exercise by B. K. S. Iyengar, first published in English. It describes more than 200 yoga postures or asanas, and is illustrated with some 600 monochrome photographs of Iyengar demonstrating these.
The book has been described as the 'bible of modern yoga', and its presentation of the asanas has been called "unprecedented" and "encyclopedic".
It has been translated into at least 23 languages and has sold over three million copies.
Yoga is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices from ancient India, forming one of the six orthodox schools of Hindu philosophical traditions. In the Western world, however, yoga is often taken to mean a modern form of medieval Hatha yoga, practised mainly for exercise, consisting largely of the postures called asanas.
B. K. S. Iyengar (1918-2014) was born in a poor family of Brahmins in Karnataka, India. In childhood he suffered from diseases including typhoid, malaria and tuberculosis, and became extremely stiff. At the age of 18 he decided to spend his life doing yoga, and by 1938 he was already performing the asanas fluently. The violinist Yehudi Menuhin became his pupil in 1952 and then invited him to teach in Europe, which he did from the 1960s. Iyengar made yoga popular, first in India and then around the world.
Light on Yoga was first published in English by George Allen and Unwin in 1966, with a foreword by his pupil, the violinist Yehudi Menuhin. Revised editions were brought out in 1968 and 1976. A paperback edition was published by The Aquarian Press in 1991 under the Thorsons imprint. The book became an international best-seller; it has been translated into at least 23 languages including Chinese, Czech, Hebrew, Japanese, Hungarian, Portuguese, Russian, and Thai and has sold over three million copies.
The book has three parts: a technical introduction to yoga, in which hatha yoga is explained to be one of the eight limbs of yoga; a detailed illustrated description of the asanas (some 200 postures, illustrated by some 600 monochrome photographs of Iyengar), followed by a brief account of the bandhas and kriyas; and an account of pranayama, yoga breathing. An appendix defines a set of asana courses, i.e. which postures to do each week, building up in difficulty, in courses structured to last up to 300 weeks. A second appendix defines the asanas supposed to be "curative" for a range of diseases and conditions from "Acidity" to "Varicose Veins". The book has a glossary of all the Sanskrit terms employed.
Each asana is named in Sanskrit with its etymology, graded, and described separately with two or more pages of text and monochrome photographs of Iyengar. For example, Utthita Trikonasana, the extended triangle pose, is stated to be at grade 3 out of a possible 60 in terms of difficulty. The technique for going into the triangle pose, performing it, and returning from it, is described in eight steps. The technique is written as a set of instructions, such as "Inhale deeply and with a jump spread apart the legs sideways 3 to 3½ feet". Its claimed effects on the muscles and body are described in a concluding paragraph. The three photographs show Iyengar in a preparatory pose and then in the triangle pose itself from front and rear.
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Light on Yoga
Light on Yoga: Yoga Dipika (Sanskrit: योग दीपिका, "Yoga Dīpikā") is a 1966 book on the Iyengar Yoga style of modern yoga as exercise by B. K. S. Iyengar, first published in English. It describes more than 200 yoga postures or asanas, and is illustrated with some 600 monochrome photographs of Iyengar demonstrating these.
The book has been described as the 'bible of modern yoga', and its presentation of the asanas has been called "unprecedented" and "encyclopedic".
It has been translated into at least 23 languages and has sold over three million copies.
Yoga is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices from ancient India, forming one of the six orthodox schools of Hindu philosophical traditions. In the Western world, however, yoga is often taken to mean a modern form of medieval Hatha yoga, practised mainly for exercise, consisting largely of the postures called asanas.
B. K. S. Iyengar (1918-2014) was born in a poor family of Brahmins in Karnataka, India. In childhood he suffered from diseases including typhoid, malaria and tuberculosis, and became extremely stiff. At the age of 18 he decided to spend his life doing yoga, and by 1938 he was already performing the asanas fluently. The violinist Yehudi Menuhin became his pupil in 1952 and then invited him to teach in Europe, which he did from the 1960s. Iyengar made yoga popular, first in India and then around the world.
Light on Yoga was first published in English by George Allen and Unwin in 1966, with a foreword by his pupil, the violinist Yehudi Menuhin. Revised editions were brought out in 1968 and 1976. A paperback edition was published by The Aquarian Press in 1991 under the Thorsons imprint. The book became an international best-seller; it has been translated into at least 23 languages including Chinese, Czech, Hebrew, Japanese, Hungarian, Portuguese, Russian, and Thai and has sold over three million copies.
The book has three parts: a technical introduction to yoga, in which hatha yoga is explained to be one of the eight limbs of yoga; a detailed illustrated description of the asanas (some 200 postures, illustrated by some 600 monochrome photographs of Iyengar), followed by a brief account of the bandhas and kriyas; and an account of pranayama, yoga breathing. An appendix defines a set of asana courses, i.e. which postures to do each week, building up in difficulty, in courses structured to last up to 300 weeks. A second appendix defines the asanas supposed to be "curative" for a range of diseases and conditions from "Acidity" to "Varicose Veins". The book has a glossary of all the Sanskrit terms employed.
Each asana is named in Sanskrit with its etymology, graded, and described separately with two or more pages of text and monochrome photographs of Iyengar. For example, Utthita Trikonasana, the extended triangle pose, is stated to be at grade 3 out of a possible 60 in terms of difficulty. The technique for going into the triangle pose, performing it, and returning from it, is described in eight steps. The technique is written as a set of instructions, such as "Inhale deeply and with a jump spread apart the legs sideways 3 to 3½ feet". Its claimed effects on the muscles and body are described in a concluding paragraph. The three photographs show Iyengar in a preparatory pose and then in the triangle pose itself from front and rear.