To compare styles, we compare most of the popular translations of Sun Tzu's The Art of War to give you an idea of how translations vary.

To do this, we used the same section of the original Chinese text. We looked for a stanza that could be used as a standard benchmark, having the same general meaning in all the translations. We also looked for a verse that appeared for the most part in all Chinese sources.

To give you a variety of "flavors," we compare:

You might think that because many different interpretations of each of Sun Tzu's lines are possible, you can make up your own interpretation and it would be just as valid. Nothing could be further from the truth. Sun Tzu's concepts have broad applications, but they are bound by Sun Tzu's very specific meanings for each term.

When reading modern nonfiction, you can read the lead sentences and skim the rest of most paragraphs and understand exactly what is being said. When reading science—modern or ancient—you have to read every word and every sentence carefully to learn the terminology. You can open a nonfiction book to any chapter and understand most of it without studying the preceding chapters carefully. But science and math start with developing precise language. If you skip even a few paragraphs defining their concepts, you get completely lost.