J. H. Huang
Announcing the upcoming publication of my newest book
THE DAO DE JING: LAOZI’S BOOK OF LIFE
A NEW TRANSLATION FROM THE ANCIENT CHINESE BASED ON THE LATEST ARCHAEOLOGICAL DISCOVERIES
The Dao is eternal,
has no name,
and is the Essential
—THE BOOK OF THE DAO, Chapter 32
From the bestselling translator of
THE ART OF WAR
A groundbreaking and accurate new translation of
Laozi’s DAO DE JING
From Mariner Books
an imprint of HarperCollins
early fall 2024
Bringing English readers closer than ever before to the true wisdom of the ancient DAO DE JING, J. H. Huang’s landmark new translation is the first to be based on a direct study of the earliest known copies of the 2,320-year-old original Chinese text
Composed during China’s Bronze Age, Laozi’s DAO DE JING has inspired readers around the world for centuries, revealing a path to achieving a more balanced mind and promoting harmony within ourselves and the world around us.
The wisdom of its teachings endures to this day with incredible immediacy and relevancy, offering remarkably lucid answers to the most pressing questions and challenges of our time.
And yet the Dao is equally misunderstood, especially in the West as a result of inferior translations. These errors and omissions have—until now, that is—unavoidably prevented us from correctly comprehending the teachings of Laozi. To make matters worse, many of the most popular English renderings of this book were in fact written by people who did not have the slightest acquaintance with Chinese.
The fruition of over two decades of research and comprehensive study of this ancient Chinese classic, LAOZI’S BOOK OF LIFE by J. H. Huang is drawn from the oldest known versions of the text. It incorporates the four most recent copies of Laozi’s masterpiece discovered in ancient tombs: the Guodian Chu slips, the Mawangdui silk texts, the Fu Yi version, and the Peking University bamboo slips.
The result is the most accurate and faithful translation to date, a groundbreaking dual English-Chinese edition featuring a revelatory explanatory commentary that guides readers through Laozi’s teachings.
Masterfully capturing the beauty and nuance of the original text, J. H. Huang’s translation restores the true import of Laozi’s words to the DAO DE JING.