“Foil first,” you might hear me say (with some variation) if you ever listen in on my beginner class or private lessons or even general discussions about fencing. Some might think I believe “foil only” since I spend the majority of my limited fencing time working on foil and notoriously make my students wait many months or years before they learn additional weapons.
I have struggled often with articulating just why it is I believe foil is the most important weapon, and while I think I’ve given the subject a good treatment in a number of previous writings, I’ve been thinking about this more recently. Why (really, truly) do I believe that the spartan, academic foil should be learned ahead of—and at the beginning of one’s training to the exclusion of—every other sword? Is it simply because I have had success fencing foil that I believe in its importance? Is it simply that the foil somehow suits my personality? In reality, I believe foil is important due to an adaptability and simplicity that provides a strong foundation on which to build additional study.
Learning to fence is complicated. You must change the way you stand, the way you move. You must thoughtfully and purposefully force your body to perform actions it finds awkward. To fence well, you must be precise. Even a centimeter’s change in finger position is a matter of metaphorical life and death. You must gain the focus (or even just the ability) to control each and every muscle you possess, simultaneously engaging some and staying others. If you’re holding a point-oriented weapon, you are attempting to direct a blade into a moving target, knowing that this aforementioned centimeter’s change makes missing painfully easy. Blades are not sharp everywhere and learning to direct the hand and wrist and fingers appropriately for a successful cut is just as challenging. To complicate the matter further, you must perform and forget these micromovements simultaneously. Hesitation is death. The icing on this cake of complication is really this: you must perform unflinchingly despite a steel weapon hurling toward you, intent on making contact with your flesh. Fencing is undoubtedly, unabashedly difficult. It’s difficult physically. It’s difficult mentally. And it’s difficult no matter where or when you start. There is no reason to add to this difficulty.
When I first introduce smallsword to students, I start by explaining the ways in which the practice of smallsword differs from foil. In our school the difference between smallsword and foil is not that great. The blade work is more or less identical to foil with a slightly shorter weapon (mounted with a wider, usually triangular blade as opposed to rectangular foil blades). The real difference comes in the allowance of off-hand actions, disarms, slight grappling, and a greater range of non-linear movements. Often students get hung up on these differences. Being able to do things they cannot do elsewhere is exciting and different. Sometimes, experienced fencers hit new students simply because the students spend too much time trying to engage the novel parts of smallsword rather than relying on previous training.
This, some might say, is exactly why students should not start with foil. It is too rigid, too single-minded, too academic. Students, some might say, suffer because they are not introduced to these smallsword concepts earlier. But where others see single-mindedness, irrelevance, and rigidity, I see focus, process learning, and structure. Foil offers a basis—a foundation—for the study of other weapons because it strips the sword to its simplest both physically and conceptually. Fundamental principles in all of fencing—balance, distance, timing, tempo, focus, calm—are needed for all weapons. The limited target, the linear movement, the lightness of the weapon, and even conventions such as right-of-way focus a student on these universal basics. For this reason, foil is adaptable—applicable to anything that will later be studied.
The reason critics often denounce foil as overly academic or rigid is because of conventions such as right-of-way. At its core, right-of-way may be interpreted as requiring a fencer to remove the threat of his opponent’s attack before he is allowed to put forth his own. Right-of-way is not meant to be a rigid standard but a conceptual tool. What is the goal of fencing really? Fundamentally, fencing is about staying alive. Part of staying alive is dispatching with the enemy. If the enemy is dead, he cannot kill me. However, I will not kill him at the expense of my own life. This fundamental goal is exactly what the oft ridiculed tradition of right-of-way is about. It simply argues that if my goal is to live, I should remove my opponent’s threat first, then kill him. That’s it. No reason that staying alive should really be controversial. Throwing points out for failing to follow right-of-way is like having points docked in any other setting. My algebra teacher always wanted to see that I engaged in the right process, not just put an answer on the page. If I failed to show how I got my answer, I lost points. If I approached the process properly, I received points even if my answer was not correct. Why? Because engaging in the process will eventually bring forth the desired outcome. Likewise, a fencing student learns to respect his opponent’s threat by being “punished” when he does not. Is this unrealistic? In the sense that with real weapons there is no magic director enforcing right of way, yes. In the sense that it instills a healthy fear of the point, no. Foil teaches fencers how they ought to behave. Miraculously, fencers that learn this in foil respect it in every other weapon they learn—even when they are no longer “constrained” by the rules.
To reiterate, every part of foil, even the rules, are used to simplify swordplay conceptually if not physically. Imagine a beginning fencer struggling to handle all of the many complexities. Now, imagine throwing in a zillion more. Foil gives focus to the very complex task at hand. No need to worry about a true or false edge. No need to be concerned with off-handed actions or dagger parries or shots to the leg or non-linear passes or grappling or serious injuries. Foil gives fencing walls—walls that are made to be pushed and expanded. That is to say, foil removes some complications so that others—the basics—are studied directly. That is not to say that foil is merely simplistic. In fact, it is in many ways a very complex weapon. To delve deeply into the study of foil requires creativity, extreme efficiency, extraordinary precision, and much more. But that is a topic for another time. For now, I simply say “foil first.”
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