Caged Lion

<p><strong>The surprising story of Pilates—the man and the method.</strong></p><p>Part biography part history and part memoir<em> Caged Lion</em> untangles for the first time Joseph Pilates’s opaque life story and the perilous journey of his exercise program known the world over as Pilates.</p><p>This is the story of Joseph Pilates a gifted man who immigrated to the United States at forty-three with no assets or credentials. He not only invented an exercise regimen—which today is practiced by more than ten million people—but in the process reinvented himself.</p><p>John Howard Steel brings Joseph Pilates and his eponymous exercise regime to life from his unique perspective as a student friend and confidant. Joe’s influence profoundly changed Steel’s life; in turn Steel was crucial for the survival of the Pilates Method and Joe’s legacy. Steel’s vivid account traces the expansion of Pilates from a small cadre of dedicated adherents through two periods of near extinction to the global sensation it is today. Steel describes Joseph Pilates’s years as a prisoner during World War I Joe’s motivation to discover his system of exercises his inspirational teaching technique and the unique attraction of the Pilates Method. It’s quite a story.</p>