Sūnzǐ: The Art of War

Table of Contents & Introduction

Introduction

Who Was Sūnzǐ?

SŪN Wǔ 孙武 was a native of the feudal state of Qí 齐 (roughly in modern Shāndōng 山东 province) in the late VIth century BC, during China’s Spring & Autumn Period (period 04d). (Click here for dissenting view.) He was famed for his brilliance in strategy and tactics, and history has accorded him the honorific suffix zǐ 子, “master,” so he was known as “Master Sūn” (Sūnzǐ 孙子).

Sūn Wǔ is believed to be the author of China’s most famous manual of military tactics and strategy, a work known to history as Master Sūn’s Art of War (Sūnzǐ Bīngfǎ 孙子兵法). Some people think it was written specifically for Hélú 阖庐 (= Hélǘ 阖闾), the monarch of the more southern state of Wú 吴 (in modern Jiāngsū province), but in any case Hélú seems to have read it and to have appointed Sūn Wǔ to run his wars, which was accomplished with great success as the state of Wú expanded aggressively northward into the much larger state of Chǔ 楚. We know nothing of what Sūn Wǔ may have thought about Hélú's imperialism. His interest was effective warfare, not political morality.

The Art of War has enjoyed continuing popularity, both at home and in translations, and is often simplistically regarded as the "secret" of Chinese success in whatever Chinese happen at the time to be successful at. However the underlying logic of Sūnzǐ's approach is not particularly abstruse:

• One takes account of all factors and tries to get one's ducks in a row before launching an attack. That would seem obvious.
• And one keeps the opposition in the dark about one's plans, or, as the proverb has it, "a soldier does not disdain deceipt" (bīng bù yàn zhà 兵不厌诈). Misdirecting the attention of the enemy (or the customer or the audience) is clearly effective, even if it is not very attractive when carried to extremes (for example, in deceptive commercial practices). But as an abstract principle it is hardly subtle.

Still, Sūnzǐ's formulations remain thought-proviking, and mindfulness of them has clearly benefitted many of his admirers.

Sūn Wǔ is easily confused with his colorful descendent, SŪN Bìn 孙膑, and some writers mix their two biographies together or attribute the Art of War to Sūn Bìn.

(Click here for more about Sūn Bìn.)

(Click here for interesting but password-protected stories about both of these men.)

Who Was Lionel Giles?

Lionel Giles (1875-1958), whose translation of the Art of War is presented here, was the son of Herbert Giles (1845-1935), one of the most formidable Victorian translators of Chinese texts into English. But “Young Lionel,” far from living entirely in his father’s shadow, was an excellent and productive translator himself, and in 1936 was appointed to the post of Keeper of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts at the British Museum.

Among his other projects, Lionel Giles was probably the most learned and meticulous translator to date of Sūnzǐ’s Art of War, including in his 1910 version not only a new and careful translation of the text itself, but selective translations and paraphrases from the most famous Chinese commentaries on the text from across many centuries, as well. And he offered his own comments upon both the original and the commentaries, plus his own observations on parallels and contrasts with war as conducted in the West, from classical antiquity to modern times. His was, in other words, a very impressive work. (For this on-line presentation, his notes are omitted or occasionally incorporated as bracketed insertions into the text itself.)

Trials of a Translator

Translating The Art of War poses all of the problems that approaching other ancient Chinese texts does. Here are three of what computer programmers might call “known issues” in the text as we have it:

1. The extremely compact style of the written language often creates ambiguities, and different commentators have sometimes interpreted the same passage quite differently. For example, Giles translates one line in chapter 12 as “In order to carry out an attack [using fire], we must have means available.” (Xíng huǒ bì yǒu yīn, yīn bì sù jù. 行火必有因，因必素具。) But then he notes:

   CÁO Gōng 曹公 thinks that “traitors in the enemy’s camp” are referred to. … But CHÉN Hào 陈皥 is more likely to be right in saying: “We must have favorable circumstances in general, not merely traitors to help us.” JIǍ Lín 贾林says: “We must avail ourselves of wind and dry weather.”

   It is striking that three highly educated native speakers could interpret the same passage so differently. The first of these commentators lived at the end of the second century AD, the second in the 800s, the third sometime between 650 and 900. Although generally guided by the views of these and other earlier commentators, Giles is also informed by what makes military sense, and is willing to stand against them when their various interpretations seem incongruent with anything Sūnzǐ could plausibly have meant.
2. Another difficulty shared with other ancient texts is the corruption that time so generously provides as scribes make errors or repeat the errors of earlier scribes, or as parts of the text are lost or intrusive material added by anonymous "helpers" of posterity. Sūnzǐ’s work has not been exempt from this, despite the fawning of some of his admirers. Giles is clearly an admirer, but he is not blind to what centuries of recopying can do to a text. At one point he enumerates a list of disconcertingly repetitive or disorganized passages and closes his discussion by writing:

   I do not propose to draw any inferences from these facts, beyond the general conclusion that Sun Tzu’s work cannot have come down to us in the shape in which it left his hands: Chap. VIII is obviously defective and probably out of place, while XI seems to contain matter that has either been added by a later hand or ought to appear elsewhere.

3. For Sūnzǐ’s book, as for some other old texts, there are minor differences in the copies available to us. Usually they make little difference to the sense of a passage, which is part of why they are propagated century after century. (In our own era of text scanning, we are introducing our own variations into this tradition of errors, and Internet postings are rarely perfect.) For example line 3 of the first chapter reads:
   • 道者，令民與上同意也，故可與之死，可與之生，而民不畏危。
     (Source: John Minford (ed) 2008 Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” Tokyo: Tuttle.)
   • 道者，令民於上同意，可與之死，可與之生，而不危也；
     (Source: Chinese Classics & Translations website)
   • 道者，令民與上同意者也，可與之死，可與之生，民弗詭之。
     (Source: China Knowledge website)
   • The moral law causes the people to be in complete accord with their ruler, so that they will follow him regardless of their lives, undismayed by any danger.
     (Source: Giles’ translation)
   
   
   For the present effort, I have generally followed the “Chinese Classics & Translations” website for the Chinese text. Various editions have different numbering for the sections of the chapters. For present purposes, I have assigned new numbers, and often have provided their own numbers to quite short lines in order to faciliate reference in class discussion. Where Giles has used numbered lists, I have substituted letters if there was risk of confusion with the line numbers. The user may alternate between the default bilingual version and an English-only version by clinking on toggle links at the top and bottom of each page. Line numbering is the same in both versions.

Conclusion:

Despite the efforts of countless others who have produced English versions of this eternally popular text, Giles’ effort stands the test of time as consistently well informed, thoughtful, and carefully worded. Sūnzǐ continues to be well served by it. Both the Chinese text and Giles’ translation and commentaries are readily available on the Internet. A good printed version of Giles’ translation and notes, with all Chinese words (other than Sūnzǐ's name, oddly) converted to modern (but toneless) Pinyin spellings, is that of John Minford, mentioned above. Minford also published his own translation, listed among many others in his edition of Giles’ work.

Return to top.
Go to first text file