I had a number of problems with this book. To begin with, those of you who are familiar with Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance are probably aware that the main premise of this book contradicts the moral he drew from his last one. He takes an indescribable and undividable conception of quality, and proceeds to describe and divide it. To make matters worse, he makes the same mistake as philosophers throughout history by failing to realize that pure abstractions like dynamic and static quality are obscure and fail to describe reality as we experience it.

These, however, are minor criticisms compared to this: Almost all of the ideas in this book have already been written by the process philosophers. In particular, Pirsig rips off Henri Bergson to an astounding degree and Bergson is much more clear about his ideas. Basically, my recomendation would be to avoid this book entirely and pick up 'The Creative Mind: An Introduction to Metaphysics' by Henri Bergson instead and see for yourself what I've been trying to say.

After ten years or so, all that stayed with me was the main character barely being able to wait for Lila to leave, then once she does, he fantasizes about the wonderful life they would have had together, and how he could have "helped" her. This is a perfect example of what is popularly referred to as "commitment phobia."

Also the name "Lila Blewitt" sounded like something out of a Thomas Pynchon novel. She had potential but she blew it?