About Wonder Book Maryland, United States
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With 3 stores less than 1 hour outside the DC/Metropolitan area (1 in Gaithersburg, 1 in Frederick and 1 in Hagerstown, MD), we have the largest selection of books in the tri-state area. Wonder Book and Video has been in business since 1980 and online since 1997. We have over 1 Million books for sale on our website and another 1 Million books for sale in our 3 locations. We have a very active online inventory and as such, we can receive multiple orders for the same item. We fill those orders on a first come first serve basis, but will refund promptly any items that are out of stock. Since 1980 it has always been about the books. ALL kinds of books from 95 cent children\'s paperbacks to five figure rare and collectibles. A merging of the old and new is where we started, and it is where we are today. Our retail stores have always been places where a reader can rush in looking for a title needed for a term paper that is due the next day, or where bibliophiles can get lost \"in the stacks\" for as long as they wish. In 2002 USAToday recognized us as \"1 of 10 Great Old Bookstores\", and we have been featured in numerous other newspaper and TV stories including Washington Post and CSpan.
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From the publisher
Sun-tzu lived in China in the fourth century B.C., serving as a court minister during the "Warring States" period. He delivered his pronouncements about war over the course of his career, but his words were recorded by other hands. Karl Von Clausewitz (1780-1831) was a Prussian soldier who fought in the Moscow campaigns of 1812 and 1813. He spent over a dozen years writing On War, dying before his book saw publication in 1832.
Ralph Peters is a retired army officer and the author of a noted book on strategy, Fighting for the Future: Will American Triumph? He is also the author of the novels The Devil's Garden and Traitor.
First line
Master Sun said: War is a vital matter of state.
From the jacket flap
Civilization might have been spared much of the damage suffered in the world wars this century if the influence of Clausewitz's "On War had been blended with and balanced by a knowledge of Sun-tzu's "The Art of Warfare. --B.H. Liddel Hart
For two thousand years, Sun-tzu's The Art of Warfare was the indispensable volume of warcraft. Although his work is the first known analysis of war and warfare, Sun-tzu struck upon a thoroughly modern concept: "The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting." Karl von Clausewitz, the canny military theorist who famously declared that war is a continuation of politics by other means, also claims paternity of the notion "total war." His is the magnum opus of the era of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic vars.
Now these two great military minds are made to share the same tent, metaphorically speaking, in The Book of War. What a bivouac it is, and what a conversation into the night.
Military writer Ralph Peters has written a new Introduction for this Modern Library edition.
Excerpt
THE SEEKER AND THE SAGE
Ralph Peters
This book allies humankind's two most powerful works on warfare. Distant in time, space, and culture, Karl von Clausewitz and Sun-tzu offer dueling visions, with the Prussian appalled by fantasies of bloodless war and the Chinese crying that bloodless victory is the acme of generalship, and with Clausewitz anxious to increase military effectiveness, while Sun-tzu pleads, cleverly, for military restraint. Such discord assures their relevance to our time.
There is also plentiful agreement between Clausewitz's On War and Sun-tzu's The Art of Warfare, from their mutual vilification of heads of state who attempt to micro-manage distant battles to their similar emphasis on the key role of the commander. In the end-and I speak as a soldier, after decades of consideration--these two books complete each other, like a perfect couple formed of opposites. Between them, the two texts cover myriad aspects of the human experience of war-as well as reflecting the temperaments of their divergent civilizations. Clausewitz, the Western man, sought the grail of knowledge and found the pursuit endless, bottomless, and obsessive, while the Eastern sage who wrote down the sayings attributed to Sun-tzu polished what he knew until it shone. Each attained the universal, transcending personality and the particularity of experience. In the study of warfare, they have no peers, and these works remain the brightest lanterns we have to light our darkest endeavor.
The Western text embraces war's necessity, while the Eastern one despairs of its inevitability, but they are united by the recognition that the human remains at the heart of each combat encounter and every campaign. Each holds a flank in our approach to war: Clausewitz is the apostle of the relentless will, convinced there is no substitute for victory, while Sun-tzu seems a closet pacifist, wary of victory's hollowness. The first sought to sharpen the sword, the second to restrain it. The Prussian saw the power of the armed mass, while the Chinese pitied the suffering of the common man. Sun-tzu believed that the outcome of a campaign was predictable, but Clausewitz insisted that, although the odds can be improved, risk is inherent in warfare. This debate across millennia continues today, and placing these two works together highlights the strengths and weaknesses-and the inestimable value--of each book.
Each must be read. No cram notes will do, and summaries badly serve their genius. Clausewitz appears difficult, only to yield a hard, thrilling clarity; while Sun-tzu, a quick swallow, takes a lifetime to digest. One text is long, the other appealingly short. Both are inexhaustible.
Media reviews
Citations
- Ingram Advance, 10/01/1999, Page 155
About the author
Sun Tzu lived in China in the fourth century B.C., serving as a court minister during the "Warring States" period. He delivered his pronouncements about war over the course of his career, but his words were recorded by other hands.
Karl Von Clausewitz (1780-1831) was a Prussian soldier who fought in the Moscow campaigns of 1812 and 1813. He spent over a dozen years writing
On War, dying before his book saw publication in 1832.
Ralph Peters is a retired army officer and the author of a noted book on strategy,
Fighting for the Future: Will American Triumph? He is also the author of the novels
The Devil's Garden and
Traitor.
