Tao Te Ching

Few books have expressed so much with so little as the Tao Te Ching. Its authorship is uncertain – it may have been written around two and a half thousand years ago, perhaps by a Chinese sage called Lao Tzu – and yet it speaks to people everywhere as if it had been written yesterday. Through paradox, metaphor, and a terse, strange beauty, it explores the Tao (or Way) that is the mysterious source underlying all things, inviting the reader into a way of moving through life characterised by humility, simplicity, and non-contention. At its heart is the principle of ‘wu wei’ – effortless action, or the art of aligning so completely with the natural flow of things that force becomes unnecessary. It has fundamentally shaped great wisdom traditions such as Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism, and its imprint is also visible across centuries of Western thought, from Carl Jung to Alan Watts, from Masanobu Fukuoka and Fritjof Capra to Michael Singer. Wry, direct, and endlessly surprising, the Tao Te Ching draws from the deepest spring, and returns something pure every time you come to it.