Book Returns
Wheelin’ Grace
Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
by Franklin Freeman
Rejected by 121 publishers, Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance appeared in April 1974 to a chorus of praise that included such eminent critics as Erich Hoffer and George Steiner. “The analogies with Moby Dick are patent,” the latter wrote, breathlessly, in The New Yorker. “Robert Pirsig invites the prodigious comparison. . . . What more can one say?”
Nineteen seventy-four was the year President Nixon resigned, the energy crisis sent fuel prices soaring, and the Dow Jones declined to a low of 663. Enter Pirsig’s book, a meditation on life’s meaning and a call to an inward reform of the soul through the union of Western technological advances and Eastern mystical thought, that is, motorcycles and zen.
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Franklin Freeman is a freelance writer living in Saco, Maine, with his wife and four children.
A Journal of Mere Christianity—Delivered to Your Door
- Essays on theology, culture, and the Church
- Contributors from across the Christian traditions
Six print issues (one year) of Touchstone, plus full online access and PDF downloads for only $39.95.
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95.
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more from the online archives
32.6—November/December 2019
The Year of Our Lord 1943: Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis by Alan Jacobs by Jesse Russell
32.6—November/December 2019
An Open Letter to Christian Readers of Jordan Peterson & Roger Scruton by James Bryson
31.5—September/October 2018
Errands into the Moral Wilderness
Forms of Christian Family Witness & Renewal by Allan C. Carlson
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
