Robert Pirsig Quotes & Sayings

When you try to climb a mountain to prove how big you are, you almost never make it. And even if you do it's a hollow victory. In order to sustain the victory you have to prove yourself again and again in some other way, and again and again and again, driven forever to fill a false image, haunted by the fear that the image is not true and someone will find out. — Robert Pirsig

Within the classic mode, however, the romantic has some appearances of his own. Frivolous, irrational, erratic, untrustworthy, interested primarily in pleasureseeking. Shallow. Of no substance. Often a parasite who cannot of will not carry his own weight. A real drag on society. — Robert Pirsig

...there is a sense of defeat at having come so far to be stopped by a mystery that can never be fathomed. — Robert Pirsig

At times we seem to move in parallel rather than in combination, then at odd moments collide. — Robert Pirsig

How can I love all this so much and be insane? — Robert Pirsig

Here, in college, it was more sophisticated, of course; you were supposed to imitate the teacher in such a way as to convince the teacher you were not imitating, but taking the essence of the instruction and going ahead with it on your own. That got you A's. Originality on the other hand could get you anything - from A to F. The whole grading system cautioned against it. — Robert Pirsig

The streets of this town are broad, much broader than they need be, and there is a pallor of dust in the air. Empty lots here and there between the buildings have weeds growing in them. The sheet metal equipment sheds and water tower are like those of previous towns but more spread out. Everything is more run-down and mechanical-looking, and sort of randomly located. Gradually I see what it is. Nobody is concerned anymore about tidily conserving space. The land isn't valuable anymore. We are in a Western town. — Robert Pirsig

And because without objects there can be no subject-- because the objects create the subject's awareness of himself-- quality is the event at which awareness of both subjects and objects is made possible. — Robert Pirsig