Robert M Pirsig – Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

ISBN: 0099322617

If you ain’t heard of this one then you probably can’t relate to Afghan coats, progressive rock and a spot of terminal introspection that makes Franz Kafka look like Elton John. That’s right it’s an early 70′s cult novel. Well not so much a novel as a personal journey or series of ‘Chautauquas’ to reason the nature and purpose of things. More outdated than Wilkie Collins you might think. Well, surprisingly, no. Not only does it give a very valuable tour through philosophy but its messages and insights are as relevant today or more so than they probably were in 1974.

Our hero, his son and his alter-ego, Phaedrus take a motorcycle journey across the United States to Northern California. Each episode of the journey is superscribed with a Chautauqua, which in this book is a personal treatise on a particular aspect of the human condition but were originally the talks given in travelling tent shows before America discovered television.

If you can tune in over the first fifty pages or so I guarantee you will walk away with something valuable – philosophical insight, the nature of quality, a touch of Zen, even, if you’re into motorcycles, a fine piece on mechanical problem solving. It’s got it all. Oh, and it ends happily.

Reviewed By: Richard Hawksworth

Posted in Book Reviews