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A Standard Benchmark
Gagliardi's Translation
Sawyer's Translation
"Clavell's" Translation
Griffith's Translation
Ames' Translation
Cleary's Translation
Kaufman's Translation
The
Denma Translation
Sawyer's Translation
Sawyer's Translation: The
major strength of Sawyer's version, which was written
in the nineties, is the academic research surrounding Sun Tzu
and his era. The book includes over a hundred pages of footnotes and another hundred pages
or so of extensive historical
information. Unfortunately, this
academic knowledge proves to be a mile wide and an inch deep, especially when it
comes to the translation, which has more mistakes than many of the others. The author should have referred to a much better academic work, Ames' version,
to get the meaning of the translation on track. Instead, the
resulting work is almost a perfect example of how badly a translation can turn
out when it is done by someone who doesn't understand how competition works. Imagine a Greek scholar with no knowledge of
mathematics trying to
translate Euclid. That is the result here.
Fortunately, the translation is almost an afterthought
in this work. Wedged in the middle of the academic research—with seriously
wrong-headed opinions about the meaning of Sun Tzu—and the voluminous footnotes, the translation
itself is easy to overlook. Getting the research annotated, as
opposed to the text correctly translated, was clearly Sawyer's mission.
Though the
author keeps close to the weight of the original text, his choice of words is often strange, such as describing troops as "animated,"
or swallowing "an army acting as bait." (If you swallow a
whole army, how could it be "bait"?) Often the
translation misses the point entirely with its choice of words, such as the advice not to "approach
high mountains" instead the more common and practical translation of not
"facing the high ground."
Sawyer, while staying close to the original characters,
also sometimes inexplicably adds a word or concept not in the original. For
example, the Chinese character for "invader" is used in very specific ways
in Sun Tzu, and Sawyer adds it here in the second-to-last line where it was not used
in the original. The general sense of the translation is a sort of
sloppiness in which consistency and accuracy simply don't matter.
Our
Character Translation |
Sawyer's
Translation |
 Without
 invitation
 right
correct ’s
 banner, |
Do not intercept
well-ordered flags; |
 Do not  attack
 hall hall
of  formation, |
do
not attack well-ordered formations. |
 Here  govern
 transform  one
 also; |
This is
the way to control changes. *** |
 Make
 use
 war’s
 method, |
Thus
the strategy for employing the military: |
 High  mound
do not  face, |
Do not approach
high mountains; |
 Back  walls
do not  oppose, |
Do not confront those who
have hills behind them. |
 Pretend  flee
do not  follow, |
Do
not pursue feigned retreats. |
 Sharp  soldiers
do not  attack, |
Do not
attack animated troops. |
 Bait war
do not  feed, |
Do not
swallow an army acting as bait. |
 Returning home
 legion
do not  block, |
Do not obstruct an army
retreating homeward. |
 Encircling
troops
 must  watch-tower, |
If you
besiege an army you must leave an outlet. |
 Poor  pillage
do not  force, | Do
not press an exhausted invader. |
Here use
war’s
method also. |
These
are the strategies for employing the military. |
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