The Book Of Five Rings

Some things are interesting but all are difficult to put into perspective. You must research this deeply

The lack of substance in this work is staggering. It took me almost 7 weeks to work through this tiny, tedious, tome.
It is tempting to compare this work to The Art of War by Sun Tzu, but these books are worlds apart: the present work provides very little useful guidance while Sun Tzu's work is densely populated with actionable advice, at least for military strategists.

This book is beneficial for two types of people:
1. A man learning war or ancient Japanese fighting techniques.
2. A business man in the corporate world or a politician who is looking to rise up the ranks.

The book can be taken literally as a way to master ancient samurai techniques, or it can be taken metaphorically on how to manage business or political deals. In summary, the weapon's (words, or literal weapons) effeciveness all depends on the scenario, the location, the opponent's numbers, the opponents skills. If you bring a bow an arrow to a swordfight you will lose. Likewise, if you're very aggressive in a more conservative setting, you will once again lose. You must know your situation, your opponent, and make the best choices to succeed.

This book contains the translation of not only ‘The Book of Five Rings' by Miyomoto Mushashi, but also ‘The Book of Family Traditions on the Art of War' by Yagyu Munenori.

To summarise both in a sentence, the philosophy and physical requirements of Samurai combat.
Dating from 1645 and 1632 respectively, these are clearly timeless in application.

Both from completely different writing styles, they cover similar ground.

I read this book after watching “Samurai – Miyamoto Musashi” on Discovery channel. The introduction to this book telling the history of Miyamoto Musashi is quite different to the doco, but I found both pretty interesting.

Lots of interesting strategy ideas and ancient thinking that can be applied to the modern world.

The way to learn this is to train with two long swords, one in each hand, It will seem difficult at first, but everything is difficult at first.