- This topic has 7 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 2 months ago by sonic.penguin.
-
AuthorPosts
-
January 10, 2012 at 12:16 am #5330NiahakModerator
I came across this while flipping through my nightly reading. The book itself is "Mastering The Art of War: Zhuge Liang's and Liu Ji's Commentaries on the classic by Sun Tzu", translated & edited by Thomas Cleary.
Specifically, the story is one of Liu Ji's examples for a particular rule (this one was 'Knowledge and Battle'). I won't post the full thing, as it's a lot of typing…
Quote:During the Warring States era, the states of Wei and Zhao attacked the state of Han, which appealed to the state of Qi for help in this emergency.The government of Qi sent one of its generals with an army, which marched directly for the capital of Wei, the aggressor. When the invading Wei general heard this, he left the state of Han and returned to Wei.
Now the Qi general received some advice from Sun Bin… 'Have the army of Qi enter Wei territory and make thousands of campfires; on the next day have them make half that number of campfires, and on the next day have them make half again that number.'
The Qi army did as Sun Bin had advised. The Wei general was delighted to hear that the number of campfires was dwindling day by day, thinking that the men of Qi were defecting. He said, 'I knew the soldiers of Qi were cowards — they've been in our territory for only three days now, and more than half the army has run away.'
Consequently, the Wei general left his infantry behind and hastened in pursuit of the Qi army with only a personal force of crack troops. Calculating the speed of their pursuit, Sun Bin concluded that by nightfall the Wei force would reach an area of narrow roads and difficult passage, a place suitable for ambush.
Now Sun Bin had a large tree cut down and stripped of its bark. On the bare log he wrote, 'The general of Wei will die at this tree,' and had it placed on the road where the Wei troops would pass that night. Then he had several thousand archers conceal themselves near the road.
When the Wei general came to the place where the stripped log had been set across the road, he lit a torch to read what had been written on it. Before he finished reading, the archers of Qi, for whom the kindling of the torch became a signal to fire, lossed their arrows all at once, throwing the Wei troops into a panic. Realizing he had been outwitted and his men were beaten, the Wei general killed himself.
Not quite one-to-one, but it's surprisingly close. I wonder if there are any full accounts of the Warring States period available in English. There might be some striking parallels there along with the ones I've found for Three Kingdoms.
January 10, 2012 at 3:29 am #41780Zhuge LiangParticipantQuote:The government of Qi sent one of its generals with an army, which marched directly for the capital of Wei, the aggressor. When the invading Wei general heard this, he left the state of Han and returned to Wei.This is what we call " besieged Wei and thereby rescued Han ", IIRC Guo Tu said this to Yuan Shao when Wuchao was attacked by Cao Cao.
Quote:Realizing he had been outwitted and his men were beaten, the Wei general killed himself.This is Pang Yuan, he was once a friend of Sun Bin since they studied under Guiguzi.
I once watched a TV serires related to mind-fighting between Sun Bin and Pang Yuan and that's all I know. But one thing I can know for sure is this Warring States period is fucking awesome.
DoaE gave birth to Huo Hu.
January 10, 2012 at 4:30 am #41781NiahakModeratorI get the impression from most of the 'anecdotes' included in the book that the translator deliberately removed names.
For example, there are two pages dedicated to Lu Xun & Lu Meng's taking of Jingzhou from Guan Yu. Throughout the entire piece Lu Meng is referred to as "the retired Wu general" and Lu Xun is "the other Wu general". Sun Quan is "the King of Wu" and Guan Yu is "the Shu general". It seems entirely unnecessary to go to such lengths to avoid confusing people with (fairly straightforward, and in the case of Guan Yu highly recognizable) names.
Zhuge Liang, Liu Bei, and Cao Cao are all apparently famous enough to merit naming – as is Sun Bin – but Sima Yi, Guan Yu and Sun Quan are not. I don't think any Warring States figures are named aside from Sun Bin. Otherwise the book is well worth reading as a matter of self-improvement (although I doubt conquering a five-developer software product will have that many parallels to facing off against an enemy nation).
Quote:I once watched a TV serires related to mind-fighting between Sun Bin and Pang Yuan and that's all I know. But one thing I can know for sure is this Warring States period is fucking awesome.I'm a little jealous, I doubt a TV series like that would ever get translated much less shown over here!
Looks like there is a "Legends of the Warring States", but it uses the old Wade-Giles transcription style ("T'sao T'sao", "Sun Ch'uan", and so on) which I find horrifically unreadable. I may still give it a chance, but there's no guarantee I'll recognize names when I see them written in Pinyin afterward.
There also appears to be a movie ("The Warring States") focusing on Sun Bin and Pang Yuan that is subtitled, but reviews don't seem that great. Has anyone seen it?
January 10, 2012 at 6:35 am #41782Zhuge LiangParticipantQuote:I'm a little jealous, I doubt a TV series like that would ever get translated much less shown over here!Ah I found it, one of my countrymen uploaded all of the episodes of the film on youtube. But too bad, it's narrated in my native language so I doubt you will get to understand it easily. I remember seeing this about ten yeas ago, but I realize it in the first glance. This is the episode where Pang Yuan get killed :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__OQx9x-HFU&feature=related
I've always taken a linking to Chinese history books, espeacially in Warring States, Spring and Autumn periods and of course Three Kingdoms. Have you read any Chu-Han contention books yet? It was the fight between two warlords Liu Bang and Xiang Yu and two briliant strategists Zhang Liang and Fan Zeng, I think it's worth reading.
DoaE gave birth to Huo Hu.
January 11, 2012 at 12:52 am #41783NiahakModeratorQuote:I've always taken a linking to Chinese history books, espeacially in Warring States, Spring and Autumn periods and of course Three Kingdoms. Have you read any Chu-Han contention books yet? It was the fight between two warlords Liu Bang and Xiang Yu and two briliant strategists Zhang Liang and Fan Zeng, I think it's worth reading.I don't think any books along those lines have been published in the US – if so, they must be out of print. I can find a couple of Sima Qian's history volumes and the Warring States book I mentioned above, I think that's it.
I've unfortunately only read Three Kingdoms and Water Margin (it looks like there's a new translation out! I wonder if it's better than the one I read). Both are great works – cerebral novels, with a clear depth of history to them.
January 11, 2012 at 2:57 am #41784Zhuge LiangParticipantYeah both of them are in Four Great Classical Novels of China( the others being Dream of the Red Chamber and Journey To The West )
Sima Qian's history is good, I owned it for a long time. If you want to know deeper about the history of China, you might want to give it a try as well. Almost well-known characters of ancient China before the establishment of the Han Dynasty are there in the volumes. Some of those people I mentioned in the post above are within the book either.
DoaE gave birth to Huo Hu.
January 20, 2012 at 3:37 am #41785DragonAtmaModerator…I knew I recognized that story!
http://middlekingdomtales.com/2009/07/30/p67-advice-2/ (and the remaining dozen or so pages after it)
January 20, 2012 at 10:09 pm #41786sonic.penguinModeratorHow do you guys get time to read this stuff… >.>
Youd probably ask me how I get so much time for hacking though hehe
-
AuthorPosts
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.