Warring States Strategies Quick Read - Lasting Eloquence

Author: Zhong Kechang (Editor)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-01-01
Features: The books selected here are ones you will inevitably read at least once in your lifetime, whether you are ten, thirty, or seventy years old! A minimalist reading list of Chinese culture. From the vast collection of ancient classics, sixty masterpieces have been chosen for the first time to present the style and appearance of Chinese five thousand years of culture in an easy and enjoyable reading format. A renowned Taiwanese authority on traditional Chinese studies reviews the classics with a 21st-century perspective, traversing the past and present, covering vast distances, and guiding you into the "unfenced museum of Chinese culture."
When the fields are fertile, the people are prosperous, with ten thousand war chariots and a hundred thousand fighting forces, vast fertile plains, abundant reserves, and advantageous terrain—this is what is called the "heavenly abode," the mighty nation under heaven. With your wisdom, the cunning of the people, the use of chariots and cavalry, and the teachings of military strategy, you can unify the feudal lords and conquer the world, declaring yourself emperor and ruling.
Just by drawing back the bowstring slightly and letting out a sound, you can make a flying goose fall down. Do you believe such a thing? Take a look at the description of the story "The Goose Frightened by a Drawn Bow" in this book! The special skills of the figures of the Warring States period were not limited to these! With just a few words, they could turn the entire international situation around. The book Zhan Guo Ce is an exhibition of countless eloquent orators. Do you know how they manipulated the situation amidst frequent wars and militarism? This rewritten Zhan Guo Ce removes the lengthy debates and repetitive passions, making it more vividly and engagingly reveal the blossoming lotuses.
The Zhan Guo Ce was not the work of a single person at a single time or place. There are various manuscripts, and the titles are also diverse. In the early Western Han Dynasty, there were still different names such as "Guo Ce" (State Strategies), "Guo Shi" (State Affairs), "Shi Yu" (Speeches and Narratives), "Short and Long" (Miscellaneous Discourses), "Long Book," and "Revised Book." The content arrangement also varied, sometimes including the Chu-Han contention. By the late Western Han Dynasty, Liu Xiang, while compiling the imperial archives, organized the content in the order of the twelve states—Eastern Zhou, Western Zhou, Qin, Qi, Chu, Zhao, Wei, Han, Yan, Song, Wei, and Zhongshan—into thirty-three volumes, totaling four hundred and eighty-six chapters, and officially named it Zhan Guo Ce.