While rereading the first three chapters I was again caught up in the "Novel". As a
lifelong reader
of novels they succeed if while reading somehow my experience merges with the
experiences of the
characters. If they seamlessly merge, become one, this is good. The introduction to
reader's guide
in the 25th anniversary edition of ZAMM states:
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is essentially three books: an account of a
motorcycle
trip from Minnesota to California, a philosophical meditation on the concept of
Quality, and the
story of a man pursued by the ghost of his former self"
Lila continues with the same form. Boat trip from West to East (Book 1), a
philosophical meditation
on the Metaphysics of Quality (Book 2), and the story of a man's continued struggle
with the ghost
of his former self (Book 3). This tripartite form complicates not only the reading as
a novel, but
the task of extracting the essence of MOQ. If one limits the metaphysical inquiry to
just Book 2,
the philosophical meditation, the "life as a journey not a destination" aspect of the
others is
lost. On the other hand, if the wide diversity of interpretations of the other two
books in just
Chapter 1 (Book 2 -the MoQ- isn't introduced until p 23 in my Bantam hardback) is any
indication,
we run the risk of assigning great significance to what the author intended merely as
a simple and
normal progression in the story. In essence "putting words in the author's" mouth that
were never
intended. So literary analysis of novels is like writing a metaphysics, " a
degenerate activity,
... ah but what the hell ..let's do it anyway"
Chapter 1....
....is first and foremost novel, opening chapters of Book 1 and 3, and as such must
take on the
pragmatic mission of any novel's opening chapter(s). In 18 pages the book introduces
the main
characters, establishes the basic structure, and sets up "the inquiry into morals"
using the age old
,convoluted, but never morally neutral, medium of sex. It's a simple tale, if some
wish to "read
into it" the whole of the MoQ, they may, but I do not.
Chapter 2....
...... introduces the MoQ by name on page 23 others have amply discussed the thousands
of slips
section and others a mentioned this quote that Todd posted in his last message.
> "Your head is like that cup. It has a limited capacity and if you want to
> learn something about the world you should keep your head empty in order to
> learn it"
With this quote Pirsig introduces two concepts that I feel are and integral part of
his metaphysics.
The Western concept of the finite human mind and the Eastern Zen concept of "no mind"
In Western
terms the finiteness of the human mind is the closest thing to an "absolute" in the
MoQ. Tempered of
course by the Zen concept of "no mind" a process by which the mind can be expanded to
"be all that
it can be" with practice.
Chapter 3.......
...... hooked me during the first read and still does. From the age of 5 in 1949
until 1964 when I
left home to find my place in the world I lived 15 miles past St Xavier, a bend in a
gravel road 45
miles from nearest "town" (like in groceries) of 3000. St Xavier was one of the
earliest Jesuit
missions and boarding school established to "save the savages" and is smack in the
middle of the
Crow Indian reservation. About 50 miles to the east is the boundary between the Crow
reservation and
the Cheyenne reservation with the "Indian towns" of Lame Deer, Ashland, and.Busby.
Of course the attraction for me was not only Pirsig talking about a geography and
society I was
intimate with but that his experience with it was when I was there. As Phaedrus and
Dussenberry were
driving from Bozeman to the peyote ceremony I was probably doing something like baling
alfalfa hay
with a cloud of vision inducing hay dust swirling around my head. In my daughter's
lingo," Way cool
!" I also had an Uncle who, at that time and until he retired in the 70's, was the
Chief of Indian
Law Enforcement for the Bureau of Indian Affairs with responsibility for all the
reservations in
Montana and Wyoming. So I grew up regaled with his "Indian tales" at family
gatherings.
My take on Pirsig's claim of the Indian contribution to the American persona ? As I
posted in
"Indian Givers" 8/10/99 there are now other "non-fiction" accounts which document
this claim and
widen it to include all the Americas, north, south and in between. I posted some links
in that
message which might give some insights and other opinions.
As to Pirsig's claim that basic character of Indians is, in general, similar to the
E.A. Hoebel
description of a Cheyenne Indian male on page 44 of Lila, I think he misses a very
important point.
While he doesn't give a date for Hoebel's observation my guess is it could not be much
earlier than
the early 1900's, by this time the Indians had been in a nearly a constant state of
war with the
Europeans for almost 300 years. Over that time various tribes tried everything from
overt war, full
scale retreat and isolation, peace treaties, and even giving up and adapting the
"white man's ways".
None of these methods prove successful in dealing with their survival in the wake of
the flood of
immigrants. Clark who lives in Cherokee country just west of where I now live can
attest to probably
the most heinous actions of white Americans on that tribe. They had adapted and
established homes,
farms, villages and English teaching schools in the Carolinas only to be forcibly
ejected to
Oklahoma by US Army troops because they had land that white settlers wanted. A huge
number of them
died during the relocation and their route to Oklahoma is now known as "The Trail of
Tears" But I digress.
My take is that the Indian persona Pirsig describes was in a large part formed during
this 300
period and was an amplification of possibly ingrained behavior patterns used largely
for dealing
with enemies. And during this extended period of war, peace, and betrayal it became
the Indians
dominate "face" in their relationships with non Indians. The mention of "Indian bars"
in another
post is indicative of the last vestiage of the Indian self preservation through
isolation stance. A
recent fictional account by Pamela Sargent called "Climb the Wind" adds further
credence to this
perspective.
Life on the reservation during that time might have been somewhat like South Africa is
now. Two
separate and distinct societies, each dependant on the other, with social interaction
only on formal
occasions and neither really trusting or respecting the other. And overt racism on
both sides just
beneath a skin deep veneer. If Dussenbury was truely accepted into the Indians "heart
of hearts" he
was indeed a rare individual and one of no more than an handful in all of the West.
Interracial
marriages were and are extremely rare and those couples shunned by Indians more
fiercely than
whites. Even though this area at that time was very rural with closest neighbors
usually miles
away, no telephones, no electricity et al, there was almost no Indian family to white
family
interaction even though most went to the same public school and sometimes were "next
door" in this
rural sense, neighbors. Save for grade school and high school basketball games and the
summertime
rodeos there was very little social interaction and almost no one on one or family to
family interaction.
While whites were allowed at some Indian functions, most notable the annual Crow Fair,
a week long
rodeo, horse race, and pow wow they were never truely welcomed. But in these times
when the Indians
were in charge of the event and out numbered the whites by a huge numbers I saw
behavior that laid
waste the stone faced, reserved, plain spoken, stoic, persona both Pirsig and Hoebel
describe. When
they are in their own element they gossip, laugh, gesture, joke, fart, and belch and
are as every
bit as reserved as the mythical Polynesian. Now let a white man walk up to a teepee at
the Crow Fair
and the conversation dies, the kids quiet down and disappear, and one Indian usually
the best
speaker of English would intercept with straight forward and stoic persona to deal
with this
irritant.
One Indian Story to jive with Chapter One.
Just before time for the Crow Fair in late spring is the time that the first cutting
of hay is put up.
Most of the land on the reservation is owned by the Indians and leased to white
farmers and ranchers
so most of the Indians at that time held no regular jobs. But as Crow Fair and haying
season
approached some would look for work stacking hay to make some extra spending money to
gamble and
drink up at the fair. One year our haying was late and ran over into the 1st day of
the fair and we
had three Indians hired for the next day to finish stacking. On the way back from
taking them home
the night before my Dad said that we would probably have to finish up by ourselves as
they would
probably all go to the fair and not show up in the morning. Sure enough the next day
there house
appear deserted and after repeated knocking Dad turned to leave. Just then one of the
men partially
dressed opened the door smelling and looking seriously hung over. He apologised but
said he was just
couldn't make it today.
As Dad turn to go, the Indian winked and with a grin said, "Too much eeepee in the
teepee, no
sleepee!" eeepee being the Crow expression for f**king. That was also the first
time, probably
about 15, that I ever heard my Dad use either expression.
Bye Bye
dlt
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
