Skip to content

Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance
Stock Photo: Cover May Be Different

Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance Softcover - 2014

by ROBERT M. PIRSIG

  • New
  • Paperback

Description

RANDOM HOUSE. SOFTCOVER. Brand New. We ship fast via USPS/FedEx/DHL/Aramex Express Services. No shipping to PO BOX, APO, FPO addresses. Kindly provide day time phone number in order to ensure smooth delivery. We may ship from Asian regions for inventory purpose. 100% Customer satisfaction guaranteed! We use Fast Shipping via DHL/FEDEX/UPS
New
NZ$16.75
NZ$21.63 Shipping to USA
Standard delivery: 7 to 14 days
More Shipping Options
Ships from Books WorldWide Express (Texas, United States)

Details

About Books WorldWide Express Texas, United States

Biblio member since 2009
Seller rating: This seller has earned a 5 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.

We sell all types of international text books since 5 years and provide better customer service all over the world.

Terms of Sale:

30 day return guarantee, with full refund including shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged. Return address: Sharonda Watts, 5701 Martin St Lot 1, Fort Worth, TX76119, USA.

Browse books from Books WorldWide Express

About this book

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values was written in 1974 by Robert M. Pirsig, a commentary on the Metaphysics of Quality within a growing commercialized society. The work is a fictionalized autobiography narrating a 17-day motorcycle journey across the U.S. with his son, Chris, and his friends John and Sylvia Sutherland.

 The trip is punctuated by numerous philosophical discussions, referred to as Chautauquas by the author, on topics including epistemology, the history of philosophy, and the philosophy of science. The interactions of these romantic philosophically driven discussions are tied by the author, who refers to his past self as Phaedrus. 

Author Robert M. Pirsig, a teacher of creative and technical writing at a small college, became engrossed in the question of what defines good writing, and what in general defines good, or "Quality", which he understood similar to Tao. His philosophical inventions and investigations later left him mentally ill, forcing him to reconcile with his past during his trip. 

"Quality . . . you know what it is, yet you don't know what it is. But that's self-contradictory. But some things are better than others, that is, they have more quality. But when you try to say what the quality is, apart from the things that have it, it all goes poof! There's nothing to talk about. But if you can't say what Quality is, how do you know what it is, or how do you know that it even exists? If no one knows what it is, then for all practical purposes it doesn't exist at all. But for all practical purposes, it really does exist."


First Edition Identification

William Morrow & Company published a first Edition hardback in New York, 1974. The book is held together in Octavo sizing and covered with a dust jacket. Jacket design by Paul Bacon features a wrench coming out of plant leaves. 


The Bodley Head published the first Edition, first UK Printing in London, 1974. The hardback is cloth bound and illustrated dust jacket. The UK dust jacket, illustrated by John Sewell, features a romanesque statue sitting thoughtfully atop a motorcycle, with a plant coming from their head.