The Art of War
by 孙武 (Sun Tzu) · first published 1900
32% recommend65% neutral3% critical
Why HN recommends it
Short, public-domain text on military strategy that readers apply to business, games, and everyday conflict; valued for ideas like winning without fighting and preparedness. Suits anyone wanting a strategy primer.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
The Art of War is an ancient Chinese military treatise dating from the Late Spring and Autumn Period. The work, which is attributed to the ancient Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu
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…Maintenance. How Buildings Learn by Stewart Brand. Founders at Work by Jessica Livingston. Tipping Point by Malcom Gladwell. Freakonomics, by Levitt and Dubner. Against the Gods by Peter Bernstein. The art of war by Sun Tzu. The 33 Strategies of War by Robert Greene. The Design of Everyday Things (formerly The Psychology of Everyday Things) by Donald Norman. Many HN readers recommend Structure and Interpretation…
on “Ask HN: Books That Gratify One's Intellectual Curiosity?” ↗…Mechanized Combat by James R. McDonough 5. The Art of Maneuver: Maneuver-Warfare Theory and AirLand Battle by Robert Leonhard 6. Strategy: Second Revised Edition (Meridian) by B. H. Liddell Hart 7. The Art of War by Niccolò Machiavelli 8. Hagakure: The Book of the Samauri by Tsunetomo Yamamoto 9. The Emperor's Handbook: A New Translation of The Meditations by Marcus Aurelius 10. The Art of War (Shambhala…
on “Ask HN: good books about military strategy?” ↗Right off the bat, here you go: 1. The 7 habits of highly successful people (Stephen Covey) 2. The Miracle Morning (Hal Elrod) 3. Business Model Generation (Aelxander Osterwalder) 4. The Art Of War (Sun Tzu) 5. The E-myth, why most businesses don't work and what to do about it (Michel Gerber) 6. Made In Japan (Founder of Sony, Akio Morita) 7. How to win friends and influence people (Dale Carnegie)…
on “Ask HN: Which books do you wish you'd read earlier in life?” ↗Nassim Nicholas Taleb -- The Black Swan Sun Tzu -- The Art of War Lao Tzu -- Tao Te Ching
on “Ask HN: Please name two of your most favorite books.” ↗…ready to drop a service when they start acting against your interests or the interests of society as a whole. [0] CGP Grey, Rules for Rulers - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs [1] Sun Tzu, Art of War - https://sites.ualberta.ca/~enoch/Readings/The_Art_Of_War.pdf [2] Joseph Tainter, Collapse of Complex Societies - http://wtf.tw/ref/tainter.pdf [3] Nassim Taleb, Antifragile - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifragile…
on “DeleteFacebook: Perspective from Mastodon” ↗…forward to reading "The Long Tail" and "The starfish and the spider"...has anyone read them yet? 6. Why We Buy 7. Hackers and Painters 8. The E-Myth revisited 9. The Art of the Start 10. On War, The Art of War by Machiavelli and Sun Tzu (not exactly for startups, but definitely useful) 11. Crossing the Chasm
on “Startup founders, what books did you find most helpful?” ↗…Software Developer's Guide to Surviving 'Mission Impossible' Projects- also a classic. 3. Thinking fast and slow - a great introduction to biases that will affect your thinking in any project. 4. The Art of War - strategy and tactics for attacking any problem. My personal favorite translation is by Thomas Cleary.
on “Ask HN: Books you should have read when you start a career in SE / CS?” ↗The best war is the war that can be won without a single fight, without a single battle. A great accomplishment with no waste of resources. The Art of War by Sun Tzu is quite a read. Did you read it? Well.. your enemies are reading it.
on “Remote war is bad war” ↗I did the same, when I couldn't improve my SCII rank beyond Master 3. A classic textbook about strategy is "The Art of War" by Sun Zhu. It's public domain and pretty short. Another great books are "The 48 Laws of Power" and "The 33 Strategies of War". For anything more complex, I recommend you to look into game theory.
on “The Battle of Helm’s Deep, Part I: Bargaining for Goods at Helm’s Gate” ↗1) Musashi's Book of Five Rings 2) Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People 3) Machaivelli's The Prince 4) Sun-Tzu's The Art of War 5) Hayakawa's Language in Thought and Action 6) Steven Johnson's Emergence 7) Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel 8) Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything 9) Mark Buchanan's Nexus 10)…
on “What books would you recommend reading? Why?” ↗Programming Collective Intelligence - O'Reilly Media Toby Segaran Art of the start - Guy Kawasaki The art of war - Sun Tzu
on “Ask YC: What would you put on a hacker's bookshelf?” ↗I would recommend: 1) The Art of War by Niccolò Machiavelli (read by Napoleon) 2) Certain to Win by Chet Richards (talks about OODA loop by John Boyd)
on “Ask HN: good books about military strategy?” ↗As a tradition, no. Old books like this are often read in a management context. For example, at my local book shop, The Book of Five Rings is in the Business section[1]. The Art of War by Sun Tzu[2] can be applied to any context you want and it's usually still good advice. Re: The Art of War[3], wikipedia says: > There are business books applying its lessons to office politics and…
on “Bad Indian Programmers” ↗EDIT: I as well assumed you were referring to Sun Tzu. I can't speak to whether my comments hold for Machiavelli's at all. If you've lumped "The Art of War" into the same category in your mind as Ayn Rand's writings, I suggest you to read it. You may find yourself pleasantly surprised. Aside from being both commonly cited as influential (in greater or lesser…
on “Yahoo scanned customer emails for US intelligence” ↗…Misjudgment', speech at Harvard, unpublished Packard, Vance (1957) Hidden Persuaders Patterson et al. (2012) Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High, 2E Sun Tzu (ca. 400 BCE) Art of War INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY / STATISTICS Bowden, Mark (2011) Worm: First Digital World War Brooks, Frederick (1995) Mythical Man-Month, 2E Hunt, Andrew and David Thomas (1999) Pragmatic Programmer Levy,…
on “Ask HN: Are there any books that inspire or highly influence the way you work?” ↗