too lazy to read this thread - all two pages of it. it was fucking great read for me! going thru a cross roads at the time - shall i be a lazy fun loving lay about for ever? must admit i did have loads of time on my hands to read and appreciate it. all of that "story within a story" is a bit like "sophie's world"
zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance
- Thread starter Gavin Bl
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ska invita
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jæd said:
Whats dull is hiw writing style - very paperbackish: its not high literature -its mundane. He's not a writer, more a thinker, who is using the novel form to express his ideas.
Can anyone actually breakdown the stuff about quality. God know he wrote pages and pages about it.
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Here isa powerpoint presentation with some key quality quotes from the book:
http://www.bill.tubbs.name/qualityideas.ppt
No Powerpoint? View as HTML:
http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:...motor+quality&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&client=opera
http://www.bill.tubbs.name/qualityideas.ppt
No Powerpoint? View as HTML:
http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:...motor+quality&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=4&client=opera
ska invita
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More stuff about the philosphy proposed:
http://www.synaptic.bc.ca/ejournal/Robert_M_Pirsig.htm
http://www.synaptic.bc.ca/ejournal/Robert_M_Pirsig.htm
floopadelic
New Member
niksativa said:
The key point that I took away from the book was that quality is not a property that an object posesses. Quality is an event - it's the interaction between a person and an object that defines quality.
(he uses quality to mean excellence, which I think makes it harder to grasp sometimes)
That's my grossly over-simplistic reading of it anyway
Mrs Bradley
wears the trousers
I have to admit I only bought it for the groovy cover - how crap eh?
fudgefactorfive
New Member
I read it and the sequel "Lila" in one go many years ago. It's one of those books which lifts you up with a new, profound understanding of something very satisfying and gives you a completely new view on the world, which then evaporates over the space of the next few weeks, leaving you completely unable to remember what it was all about.
ginger_syn
Her Insanity laughs under pressure...👾
its a good book to read, but not an easy one, and I can't say it changed my life, but it did change the way I thought about things,well it made me think about the stuff I just accepted, its actually hard to define the affect it had on me really, I suppose the best way to describe it is that it opened some doors that I later choose to walk through
thats the closes I can get, its hard to describe and I'm going to stop
thats the closes I can get, its hard to describe and I'm going to stop
I have read it three times, for some reason 
there's basically three strands that intertwine to form the story
1) a real-time road trip across america
2) a psychological investigation of a guy who went crazy searching for a philosophical truth
3) a fairly abstract musing on the nature of 'quality'
the first time I read it, age 17, I lapped it all up. second time, (27 ish?) I missed out a lot of the 'quality' stuff. the third time, age about 32, I basically just read the road-trip bits, the other parts really got on my tits... I think I absorbed a few of his most interesting points the first time I read it ('the Buddha resides as comfortably in a motorcycle engine as in a lotus blossom' or something like that) and after that, all the rest of that 'quality' blah just felt well, irrelevant at best.
also, I started to feel he was a bit of a git towards his son, and it irked me. you can see the other couple in the book trying to make up to the son for it, especially at the campfire scene if I recall correctly... while he once again goes off into his schpiel about quality and meaning...
there's basically three strands that intertwine to form the story 1) a real-time road trip across america
2) a psychological investigation of a guy who went crazy searching for a philosophical truth
3) a fairly abstract musing on the nature of 'quality'
the first time I read it, age 17, I lapped it all up. second time, (27 ish?) I missed out a lot of the 'quality' stuff. the third time, age about 32, I basically just read the road-trip bits, the other parts really got on my tits... I think I absorbed a few of his most interesting points the first time I read it ('the Buddha resides as comfortably in a motorcycle engine as in a lotus blossom' or something like that) and after that, all the rest of that 'quality' blah just felt well, irrelevant at best.
also, I started to feel he was a bit of a git towards his son, and it irked me. you can see the other couple in the book trying to make up to the son for it, especially at the campfire scene if I recall correctly... while he once again goes off into his schpiel about quality and meaning...
fudgefactorfive
New Member
snouty warthog said:
I know exactly what you mean, but I think he has some awareness of that, and is trying to write about it ... it seemed fairly obvious to me that he regrets that his own personal obsessions led him to being sectioned and that he feels he failed his family, hence the "road trip" element, seeking to make some kind of new connection with his son ...
... Picked up a modern reprint and it was strangely affecting to read that the son was killed in New York, in his early twenties, long after the book had reached cult status.
I take your point, fff. I think he was trying his best. and yes, I was also saddened to read of the death of his son...
ska invita
back on the other side
snouty warthog said:
aye - he';s a grumpy git - reminded me of the worst holidays with my dad
fudgefactorfive said:
You should be a literary critic fff. Or perhaps you are. I will try to memorise this quote to use myself.
Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
Gavin Bl said:
I read it a long time ago. It was interesting, but not revelatory, except to reveal that Pirsig was at one time, a nutcase.
Meltingpot
Living in our pools we soon forget about the sea
I have read it three times, for some reason
1) a real-time road trip across america
2) a psychological investigation of a guy who went crazy searching for a philosophical truth
3) a fairly abstract musing on the nature of 'quality'
the first time I read it, age 17, I lapped it all up. second time, (27 ish?) I missed out a lot of the 'quality' stuff. the third time, age about 32, I basically just read the road-trip bits, the other parts really got on my tits... I think I absorbed a few of his most interesting points the first time I read it ('the Buddha resides as comfortably in a motorcycle engine as in a lotus blossom' or something like that) and after that, all the rest of that 'quality' blah just felt well, irrelevant at best.
also, I started to feel he was a bit of a git towards his son, and it irked me. you can see the other couple in the book trying to make up to the son for it, especially at the campfire scene if I recall correctly... while he once again goes off into his schpiel about quality and meaning...
Yeah, I have that feeling too and a similar reaction. I read the book in my second year at Uni when I should have been studying my course textbooks
There are a lot of meanderings off into nowhere in particular in the course of the book but the core what he's trying to do with it is rehabilitate the Greek Sophists whom he believes have had a bum rap from philosophers down through the ages. I'd say he's been successful.
The Metaphysics of Quality has its own website now, and you could even study it at Liverpool the last time I looked.
gentlegreen
I hummus, therefore I am ...
Blimey !
I read it several times but don't remember any of that.
It works on a lot of levels. I repeatedly refer to the "beer can shim" bit in my approach to solving technical problems. (my 2CV's passenger seat was shimmed with squashed tomato cans. )
I'm currently perplexed by the inability of otherwise highly intelligent people to "visually parse" a PC when it's mounted in an equipment rack. If they can't do that, is it any surprise they have always deleted my emails containing printer queuenames marked "DO NOT DELETE". ?
I read it several times but don't remember any of that.
It works on a lot of levels. I repeatedly refer to the "beer can shim" bit in my approach to solving technical problems. (my 2CV's passenger seat was shimmed with squashed tomato cans.
)I'm currently perplexed by the inability of otherwise highly intelligent people to "visually parse" a PC when it's mounted in an equipment rack. If they can't do that, is it any surprise they have always deleted my emails containing printer queuenames marked "DO NOT DELETE". ?
I read it and found it pretty life-changing at the time (mind you I was a student and taking quite a lot of hallucinogenics so that judgement may not stand up now).
Found a lot of it really inspiring and thought-provoking, but the whole 'quality' concept i wasn't convinced by; try telling someone flipping burgers in McDonald's that if they just try and see the quality in what they are doing they will feel generally more rewarded and happy.
Read 'Lila' too but it was less accessible and not as cogent as ZMM.
ZMM is one of the few books I've read that I will definitely read again
Found a lot of it really inspiring and thought-provoking, but the whole 'quality' concept i wasn't convinced by; try telling someone flipping burgers in McDonald's that if they just try and see the quality in what they are doing they will feel generally more rewarded and happy.
Read 'Lila' too but it was less accessible and not as cogent as ZMM.
ZMM is one of the few books I've read that I will definitely read again
Johnny Canuck3
Well-Known Member
Why do these two year old threads keep reappearing? 
It was recommended to me by a friend.
And I tell you what, it's last time I'm ever gonna get a Buddhist to take a look at my Vespa. It cost me £500 and the fucker did nothing to it other than make it smell like lentils!!!
And I tell you what, it's last time I'm ever gonna get a Buddhist to take a look at my Vespa. It cost me £500 and the fucker did nothing to it other than make it smell like lentils!!!
Ceej
Where is my mind?
Read it years ago and have to say although I didn't understand all of it - still don't - it was my first foray into philosophical thinking, a concept completely unknown to me in my late teens. In a way it did change my life, because it completely opened up my way of thinking.
And a cool title indeed.
And a cool title indeed.
Dillinger4
Es gibt Zeit
Ceej
Where is my mind?
Really?
Really.
