‘Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance’

My friend Sudhir Kumar made me available the reprint of a nearly five-decade-old book ‘Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance’, written by an American author Robert M. Pirsig. The title of the book may be weird, but otherwise, it is an absorbing book. It fascinated me for more than one reason. Firstly, the author of this book was an alumnus of the ‘Banaras Hindu University’ (BHU) in the early thirties where I also studied four decades later in seventies. Secondly, it has very deftly handled the intricacies of Buddhism, Hinduism and Greek philosophy. Very few people know the origin of word ‘Zen’ which is derived from Sanskrit word ‘Dhyan’(Meditation), which became ‘Chan’ in China and ‘Zen’ in Japan. One of the bestselling books of the seventies and eighties it has been printed more than forty times.

It essentially contains three books which go side by side. The first part contains the account of a motorcycle trip from Minnesota, mid-western State of the USA bordering Canada in the east to California on the Pacific Coast. The second part deals with the philosophical meditation on the concept of the ‘Quality’ and the third part gives the glimpse of a story of a man who is pursued by the ghost of his former self. Within it, we encounter the allegory of the psychological tension, a lesson in Eastern and Western School of thoughts, a conundrum about the meaning of self, a commentary on the prevailing social and physical land escape of America. Last but not the least some helpful tips on the care and maintenance of the motorcycle.

There are many esoteric questions which have been thrown up in this book like; how do we know what is true and what is not true? What makes us who we are? Can, and should, we work to change our self to fit an idea of what we want to be? Like any other great work, this book frustrates as much as it enchants. It encourages us to question our most basic belief. But there are no easy answers.

The author says that number zero (0), originally a Hindu number was introduced to the West by the Arabs during the Middle Ages which was unknown to the Ancient and Greek Romans. The number zero also shows the absurdity of trying to derive zero from any form of mass-energy as that is nothing but reductio ad absurdum.The author has tried to bring the unification of spiritual feeling and technological thoughts. The division between these two is the root cause of discontent of our age, he says. He offers some heterodox solutions, which may not be appealing to the present generation. Technology has overtaken the meditative thoughts. Nonetheless; the book is gripping and worth reading.