It’s been a very long time since I read Zen And The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. The author, Robert Pirsig, rode his little Honda across the country with his son Chris and another couple riding a BMW. I noticed just yesterday he passed away.
The story blends together their experiences on the trip with a whole lot of philosophy in an alternating narrative, there’s even a bit of motorcycle maintenance thrown in, though that is certainly not what the book is about. I read it during college back in the 70s when it was first published and it was highly acclaimed and based on my opinion at the time I would have agreed, though whether I would think the same of the book today as I did then I can’t say.
His passing is just another signpost along the road. The years when the book was new and popular are long gone, but if you’re one of the many who read it with pleasure, it’s nice to think back and smile at a simpler time.
Source: NPR
Felipe Zapata says
I also read it way back when, and I liked it. I calculate I’m a bit more than a decade older than you. I tried to read it again a few years ago, and quickly bogged down. Some things belong to their times and do not age well.
GenWaylaid says
Of all the books I’ve read, “ZAMM” is in my personal top ten. There is a lot going on, though. You’re simultaneously getting fictionalized narratives of two periods in the author’s life and a philosophical dialogue distorted by his personal trauma.
I’d recommend skimming the philosophy on the first reading and coming back to it later. I couldn’t follow Pirsig when he started talking about Aristotle, but when he was riding up the Rockies and noticed his bike started running rich I thought, “Oh, I know this one!’
nm5150 says
I kind of forgot about him.I had a friend that looked him up in the late “90s and I think he was back in an assylem again.He was one of those guys that suffered from his own successe.I loved his book and believe he was very intelligent but he thought too much.God speed young man.