Bruce Lee, Matthew Polly
Bruce Lee, Matthew Polly
11 Rating(s)
List: $34.99 | Sale: $24.50
Club: $17.49

Bruce Lee
A Life

Author: Matthew Polly

Narrator: Jonathan Todd Ross

Unabridged: 19 hr 6 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 06/05/2018


Synopsis

The “definitive” (The New York Times) biography of film legend Bruce Lee, who made martial arts a global phenomenon, bridged the divide between eastern and western cultures, and smashed long-held stereotypes of Asians and Asian-Americans.

Forty-five years after Bruce Lee’s sudden death at age thirty-two, journalist and bestselling author Matthew Polly has written the definitive account of Lee’s life. It’s also one of the only accounts; incredibly, there has never been an authoritative biography of Lee. Following a decade of research that included conducting more than one hundred interviews with Lee’s family, friends, business associates, and even the actress in whose bed Lee died, Polly has constructed a complex, humane portrait of the icon.

Polly explores Lee’s early years as a child star in Hong Kong cinema; his actor father’s struggles with opium addiction and how that turned Bruce into a troublemaking teenager who was kicked out of high school and eventually sent to America to shape up; his beginnings as a martial arts teacher, eventually becoming personal instructor to movie stars like James Coburn and Steve McQueen; his struggles as an Asian-American actor in Hollywood and frustration seeing role after role he auditioned for go to a white actors in eye makeup; his eventual triumph as a leading man; his challenges juggling a sky-rocketing career with his duties as a father and husband; and his shocking end that to this day is still shrouded in mystery.

Polly breaks down the myths surrounding Bruce Lee and argues that, contrary to popular belief, he was an ambitious actor who was obsessed with the martial arts—not a kung-fu guru who just so happened to make a couple of movies. This is an honest, revealing look at an impressive yet imperfect man whose personal story was even more entertaining and inspiring than any fictional role he played onscreen.

About Matthew Polly

Matthew Polly is the national bestselling author of American ShaolinTapped Out, and Bruce Lee. A Princeton University graduate and Rhodes Scholar, he spent two years studying kung fu at the Shaolin Temple in Henan, China. His writing has appeared in The Washington PostEsquire, Slate, Playboy, and The Nation. He is a fellow at Yale University and lives in New Haven, Connecticut.


Reviews

I remember the craze about kung fu movies when I was a young teen and then hearing about Bruce Lee’s passing and I didn’t understand a lot about it. The remedy for that was reading this book about Bruce Lee’s life. It was so engrossing for me that I read it quite quickly, although it was fairly long......more

Goodreads review by Bkwmlee

As I’ve mentioned in other reviews, I was born in Hong Kong and even though I’ve lived in the U.S. for most of my life, that has not stopped me from having a strong connection to the place of my birth. My fondness for HK runs deep and even though it is a very different place now from what it was whe......more

Goodreads review by Ashok

This book is definitely a must read for Bruce Lee fans, but I would like add that this biography could be for anyone who is looking for inspiration. He was struggling all the time and very few people believed that he could achieve the impossible - make a name in Hollywood. After working for twenty-f......more