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The Subtle Body: The Story of Yoga in America |  | Author: Stefanie Syman
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Category: Book
List Price: $28.00
Buy New: $12.99
as of 9/9/2010 07:41 MDT details
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Seller: BRILANTI BOOKS
Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 30126
Media: Hardcover
Edition: First Edition
Pages: 400
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6.4 x 1.4
ISBN: 0374236763
Dewey Decimal Number: 204.360973
EAN: 9780374236762
ASIN: 0374236763
Publication Date: June 22, 2010
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
In The Subtle Body, Stefanie Syman tells the surprising story of yoga’s transformation from a centuries-old spiritual discipline to a multibillion-dollar American industry.
Yoga’s history in America is longer and richer than even its most devoted practitioners realize. It was present in Emerson’s New England, and by the turn of the twentieth century it was fashionable among the leisure class. And yet when Americans first learned about yoga, what they learned was that it was a dangerous, alien practice that would corrupt body and soul.
A century later, you can find yoga in gyms, malls, and even hospitals, and the arrival of a yoga studio in a neighborhood is a signal of cosmopolitanism. How did it happen? It did so, Stefanie Syman explains, through a succession of charismatic yoga teachers, who risked charges of charlatanism as they promoted yoga in America, and through generations of yoga students, who were deemed unbalanced or even insane for their efforts. The Subtle Body tells the stories of these people, including Henry David Thoreau, Pierre A. Bernard, Margaret Woodrow Wilson, Christopher Isherwood, Sally Kempton, and Indra Devi.
From New England, the book moves to New York City and its new suburbs between the wars, to colonial India, to postwar Los Angeles, to Haight-Ashbury in its heyday, and back to New York City post-9/11. In vivid chapters, it takes in celebrities from Gloria Swanson and George Harrison to Christy Turlington and Madonna. And it offers a fresh view of American society, showing how a seemingly arcane and foreign practice is as deeply rooted here as baseball or ballet.
This epic account of yoga’s rise is absorbing and often inspiring—a major contribution to our understanding of our society.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 6
 Great yoga history tour of the past 100+ years July 17, 2010
Claudia M. Azula
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
Loved the book, reading it I found myself wondering about each of the yoga teachers/indian gurus depicted, their lives, how human they all were, and how yoga (slowly at times and fast at others) caught on with a passion within our fiery imagination. Perhaps I allowed myself to wonder into gossip territory, feeling the sensations of being in the shoes of an Indra Devi, or one of the Beattles while at yoga teacher training in an Indian ashram.
The tour through the major figures of yoga in America is a delight to read. Among others, the recount of Vivekandanda (refusing to teach asana and exalting the religious side of yoga), in contrast to Indra Devi (who trained with Krishnamacharya just like Iyengar and Patthabi Jois) and who:
"...Taught a form of yoga that was intensely physical and made purifying your body the necessary first stage of spiritual training"
Wealth does not get its own chapter but maybe it should cause it plays an enormous part, and speaking of parts, Sunset Boulevard comes in front of, but yet in as big letters as the "Psychedelic Sages" (Ram Das et all, and all that Harvard acid experimenting).
The one thing that left me thinking was a sentence right at the beginning (location 1707-17 in the kindle): "Lineage, far more than scriptures or even locale, is the biggest determinate of what yoga is."
I feel yoga come alive when I read this, I feel how the story is still being written.
A Literary Tour de Force September 3, 2010
Joe Karma (Columbia University, New York City)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
The Subtle Body, by Stefanie Syman, is much more than a cultural history -- it is literary tour de force. Syman's writing is perhaps some of the best in Generation X non-fiction. This is not just my opinion, read what the press has had to say:
[...]
In terms of content, Syman manages the juggernaut of yoga's cultural history by focusing on individuals who are indicative of larger things. She cogently and eloquently brings the reader into the subjectivity of her characters without getting in the way.
In the final analysis, Syman is a writer's writer who breaks new ground by uniquely bringing the topic of yoga's cultural history into the intellectual sphere.
A Literary Tour de Force September 3, 2010
Joe Karma (New York, NY.)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
The Subtle Body, by Stefanie Syman, is much more than a cultural history -- it is literary tour de force! Syman's writing is perhaps some of the best in Generation X non-fiction.
In terms of the subject matter, Syman adroitly handles the juggernaut of yoga's cultural history by focusing on individuals who are indicative of larger epochs. She cogently and eloquently brings the reader into the minds and times of her characters without getting in way.
In the final analysis, Syman is a writer's writer who breaks new ground by uniquely bringing the topic of yoga's cultural history into the intellectual sphere.
But don't just take my word for it, check out what the press has had to say:
[...]
 enjoyable but flawed August 13, 2010
J. owen (wisconsin)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a book I've wanted to see for a long time. The subject of yoga culture and teachers was central to my own life from the 60's through the 90's. I think many of you old yogis and ashramites will enjoy this book. Despite many flaws, it is entertaining.
As a book of history, this has much interesting research into the early days of American yoga thinkers and teachers. I thought the focus on Pierre Bernard was excessive compared to other teachers and Gurus (Yogananda seemed marginalized by comparison). The focus also seems very heavy on tantra and sexual scandal, which to me seemed to be there to sell more books.
The later years of yoga fly by very quickly and Ms Syman seems to prefer the media shock value and scandal of the Gurus of the 60's through 80's and miss less dramatic but important developments of the various yoga/meditation movements. I'm tired of the Beatles/Maharishi connection seeming to be the center of Mahesh's career. There Was life after the Beatles for the TM movement
This book is strong on history and source referencing but weak on cultural analysis and makes many bizarre connections. I'm sorry, but I think this person should stick to being a reporter, not an analyst.
I guarantee its worth going over to U-tube to see Elvis sing "Yoga is as yoga does', a gem of a very bad song that Stefanie mentions when citing the media dumbing down and whitewashing of yoga.
So, enjoy it. Take with a grain of NaCl.
the more things change, the more they stay the same August 27, 2010
Nicholas Nahat
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
The story of yoga in the U.S. is a fascinating journey, or set of journeys, as the practice has adapted as the author terms a 'Rorschach' test of personal interests, hopes, and fantasies. At some times the religious aspects of the practice were emphasized, of varying interpretation from different strands of Hindu and Buddhist thought. At other times, these aspects were abstracted away into 'health' benefits, 'staying young,' or 'improving sex life.' Yoga was combined with drugs in the '60s in search of the ultimate trip, and drugs were also eschewed in favor of a 'purer' practice. Some seekers were after Enlightenment, and other after tight abs. At times the meditative aspects were emphasized, but lately the 'hatha' practice of physical postures is ascendant. At this point, yoga occupies a cultural space encompassing both middle-class respectability as well as more bohemian aspirations. There are many different yogas in the U.S., just as there are in India.
The varieties that hold sway these days have a penitentary quality--Bikram, Ashtanga, or their derivatives like 'power' yoga. Yoga seems to be predominantly an activity for housewives, young women, or the wealthy. Theos Bernard was writting about yoga in the Family Circle in the 1930s, and things haven't changed much, judging by the cover and advertisements of Yoga Journal. The practice also seems to attract wealthier people, who gained their money from inheritance, actors, artists, dancers, who may be looking for 'meaning' or simply a means of looking or feeling better about themselves. Going 'deeper' into the practice often involves acquiring a guru or acquainting oneself with Hinduism or Buddhism or Sanskrit. These days, like in former times, the pilgrimage to India can confer a 'higher' status on a practicioner in many yoga communities, which is a kind of reverse chauvinism or racism, supposing that the U.S. is merely materialistic while India is spiritually more awakened--yet for every Mysore there is a Bangalore, and the country with Wall Street also has a Bible Belt, after all. Since the 19th Century, the practice has attracted those looking for a guru/disciple relationship, spiritual 'awakening' or 'evolution,' without really considering that 'evolution' doesn't mean 'higher', just 'adaptable.' Many yogis today, as in former times, will use the trope of 'discovering' yoga as a means of mitigting their 'personal suffering'--including everything from a bad back to psychological issues--which conveys a patina of 'authenticity' much sought after among some teachers.
This book is somewhat idiosyncratic, and doesn't purport to be a history of yoga, rather a 'story'--and the distinction is important. The book is mostly comprised of well-research vignettes, for example on woodrow wilson's daughter, and with a focus on particular communities, like Hollywood. An actual history with numbers of adherents or studios would be interesting, but the level of research isn't that detailed, at least in that way, since this is more of an effort based on anecdote. That said, the Notes are well done and worth a read, since they often expound at length about a textual point--it must have been a bit of an editorial struggle to decide which bits to place in the back. And there are many interesting facts and points of speculation in both, such as the impact of forbidding immigration for 50 years beginning in the early 20th century, and the impact of this 'missed opportunity' is tantalizing.
Altogether, this book is a solid contribution and will be helpful to understanding one's own yoga practice in the U.S., and situating it in s historical context. It is a resource for those in the practice to build perspective as to their own yogic motivations and aspirations, as they chase the next glittering guru, reflect on their Indian chauvinism, attempt the next asana, or reflect upon their samskara or patterns they are reinforcing in the larger social framework.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 6
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