Dokkodo. The Way of Walking Alone

Do you want someone to tell you what Musashi meant, or do you want to read what he wrote?

This edition is for those who choose the second: the twenty-one precepts Miyamoto Musashi wrote a week before his death, in his own words and beside the original Japanese. No commentary, no modern reinterpretation. Read a precept, close the book and think about it. The conclusions are yours to draw.

For those who want to start making their own decisions in life. If you feel that routine is deciding for you, these precepts are a mirror: do not reproach yourself for your past actions, do not place your trust in anything, do not be guided by your preferences, do not rebel against the paths of this world. Musashi offers no recipes and no exercises. He leaves a question in every line, and the answer is yours to find, in your own decisions.

This is a short book, and it is meant to be. The Dokkōdō, "The Way of Walking Alone", is not a treatise. It is Musashi's final testament: twenty-one precepts written in 1645 for his disciple Terao Magonojō, the same week he handed him The Book of Five Rings. This edition does not interpret the precepts. It is a book for reflection and meditation. You may think it can be read in a few minutes, but I am sure you will return to its pages for years.

Inside this edition:

• Bilingual edition: each precept on its own spread, with the original Japanese text facing the English translation.
• With rōmaji: the reading of each precept, so you can pronounce it in Japanese.
• The life of Miyamoto Musashi: his training, his duels against the Yoshioka school, Musō Gonnosuke and Sasaki Kojirō, his years in the service of the Hosokawa lords and his final retreat to the cave of Reigandō.
• The story of the original manuscript, kept today in the Kumamoto Prefectural Museum of Art, and how its authorship was confirmed.
• Musashi's closing dedication to Terao Magonojō.

For whom: those seeking discipline and clarity to make decisions in their lives; practitioners of martial arts and budō; readers of Musashi who want his last words in the original language alongside the translation; anyone drawn to Japanese thought; and anyone looking for a book to keep close or to give.

Shinden Ediciones is a publisher devoted to the classics of Japanese martial arts and strategy.

Further down, under "From the Publisher", you can see how each spread is laid out.