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“This book is a work of brilliance and genius. A work of art and philosophy that brings a unifying vision of East and West, Mind and Body, and an exploration into the nature of reality and how we come to understand it. I’ve read it dozens of times and it always delivers. It is a carefully crafted work that challenges the reader as it challenges conventional thinking.
It is not merely a fictional novel but a philosophic and mystical dialogue. It is a Western/classical presentation on Taoism. The so called failings of the book as a novel are intentional illustrations of the author’s ideas and honesty. These are not merely fictional characters but are real people who the author respects and in doing so does not falsify them with artificial attempts to fabricate detail to create a good ‘character’.
The book travels artfully on multiple and parallel lines: a recounting of a motorcycle trip, an uncovering and recounting of a past and tragic event with its consequences, a ghost story, an uncovering of someone’s past philosophic and mystical thinking, a way to put into practice philosophic ideas, a presentation of a unifying metaphysical and philosophic theory.
As Lao Tzu wrote in his first chapter of the Tao Te Ching: The Tao that can be spoken is not the Eternal Tao; the Name that can be named is not the true name. Pirsig realizes that although everything that you can name and say about Tao/Quality is not the Eternal Tao/Quality – none the less, as Lao Tzu before him, even as they both acknowledged this truth, they both went onto to explain and illustrate the meaning of Tao/Quality as best they could Lao Tzu did it in his philosophic poems in his text The Tao Te Ching. Pirsig does it through the form of a novel. Both texts are the embodiment of Tao/Quality.
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