About the book: 2013 / This book introduces you to the treatises on martial arts that were written by two legendary Japanese of the 17th century, Takuan Soho and Miyamoto Musashi. Takuan Soho was a Zen monk, calligrapher, artist, poet, gardener, tea master, and inventor of the pickling radish recipe that bears his name and is popular in Japan to this day. Takuan's writings in Japanese comprise six volumes. Today they are read with the same interest as three and a half centuries ago, finding in them a source of inspiration for the study of martial arts, as well as for any other activity in which integrity of perception, determination and spontaneity are important. Tradition says that Takuan was the teacher of the invincible sword master Miyamoto Musashi, who, at the end of his life, wrote a treatise on strategy, “The Book of Five Rings,” which is widely known among us and in the West, which ranks first in many bibliographies on the art of fencing and is a unique textbook on strategy.