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Sitaram · Site Admin Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 1079

Bob enrolls at Benares Hindu University, studying oriental philosophy for 1 1/2 years graduate study, funded by the GI Bill. [Quote] Nothing much happened ... He'd entered India an empirical scientist, and he left India an empirical scientist, not much wiser than he had been when he'd come. However, he'd been exposed to a lot and had acquired a kind of latent image that appeared in conjunction with many other latent images later on..... He became aware that the doctrinal differences among Hinduism and Buddhism and Taoism are not anywhere near as important as doctrinal differences among Christianity and Islam and Judaism. Holy wars are not fought over them .... great value is placed on the Sanskrit doctrine of Tat tvam asi, "Thou art that," which asserts that everything you think you are and everything you think you perceive are undivided. To realize fully this lack of division is to become enlightened. [Unquote] (Z25 p143)

January 1961 - The psychiatrist assigned to Bob interviews McKeon to try to get Bob reinstated at the University of Chicago, but McKeon refuses. The psychiatrist tells Bob he's not previously met anyone like McKeon and that he will be doing something further about it. He goes to the president of the University of Chicago and McKeon is overruled so that Bob is actually reinstated. When Bob meets with the Professor of Rhetoric he advises Bob to "Just write something."
January 1961 - Bob also returns to teaching at the University of Illinois, Navy Pier and is assigned a (relatively undemanding) Freshman course in business letter writing.
February 1961 - It is however, too much. A huge depression sets in so severe that Bob voluntarily commits himself to a mental hospital at Downey, Illinois.
June 1961 - Unconnected with Bob's psychiatric assessment, he receives the results of series of adult intelligence tests, which reveal (a) that he has been the subject of a "longitudinal" research study on intellectual development by the Minnesota Institute of Child Development and Welfare, (See 1938 and 1949 entries), and (b) that in terms of general intelligence he continues to score in the top 1% of all adults.
13th October 61 - Bob's paper "Quality in Freshman Writing" is delivered to the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association in Bozeman, by Professor John Parker of the Bozeman faculty while Bob is in Illinois. (GBZ p356)

Early 60 - Phædrus [Bob] is already thinking hard and exhibiting strange behavior. "We used to ride in the car to look for you ..." - Chris - "... you wouldn't even talk to us." (Z25 p175)
Spring 60 - Bob attends a Northern Cheyenne "peyote" session on Busby reservation (Lame Deer, Montana) with Verne Dusenberry, his first pursuit of Indian Anthropology. (Lila p38)(Lila p465) LaVerne Madigan of the Association of American Indians also visits with them. (She dies in a plane crash, some months after this, before the separate 1962 plane crash first mentioned above, and some years before Dusenberry dies in 1966.) (Lila p465). (Peyote or Mescal Buttons are the fresh or dried flowering tuberlces of the spineless dome shaped Peyote Cactus or Mescal (Lophophora genus, typically Williamsii species, related to Agave but quite different in appearance). This is a natural source of several alkaloids including Mescaline, which is itself named after Mescalero Apaches, just one among many Mexican and American Indian tribes that made use of it. Timothy Leary is in Mexico at exactly this time, being introduced to Psilocybin (Magic) Mushrooms (Psilocybe Mexicana, one of several Psilocybe species of the Agaric genus of fungus), and he first experiences LSD later in 1962. Mescaline and Psilocybin are distinct natural alkaloids that share similar "indole-amine" structures, as does the synthetic drug LSD, common to neurotransmitters like Serotonin and Norepinephrine, active in normal brain functioning. Strangely, whilst Mescaline and Psilocybin are distinct, they are so similar in physical form and effect, that both Mescal Buttons and Magic Mushrooms are often synonymous with Sacred Mushrooms. Detailed refs to be added.)
Spring 60 - Bob is called for interview by the program Chairman (Richard McKeon), after acceptance on course, in order to discuss and agree his "substantive field". (Z25 p337)
Summer 60 - He spends another summer in the mountains of Montana, contemplating this decision. Decides on philosophy, but then through conversations with other philosophy teachers, he is warned about McKeon and through research discovers that he is a notorious Aristotelian. (The Aristotelian notoriety at Chicago University is in fact documented by Northrop in the book Pirsig read back in 1948. Rorty also makes reference.) Bob writes a megalomaniac letter to McKeon about his own anti-Aristotelian thesis. (Z25 p337/344)
End Summer 60 - Bob receives a rejection letter just as he is departing Bozeman. He responds that he already has acceptance and travels to Chicago anyway. (Z25 p346)

September 60- On arrival, he takes up paid post teaching rhetoric at the University of Illinois (Navy Pier). His teaching timetable conflicts with the Chairman's Ideas and Methods course for which he is registered, so he enrolls on a Rhetoric course instead, thereby avoiding the Chairman. (Z25 p347/348)
September 60 - "Of all the thousands of students who had studied the ancient Greeks, it is doubtful there was ever one more dedicated." (Z25 p348) In the first session an "innocent" student is told that his personal opinions are not the subject of the course and he doesn't return. (Z25 p361/362)
September 60 - Phædrus was there solely to write a "Great Book" of his own. (Z25 p364)
September 60 - The Professor of Rhetoric likens Bob to a wolf and suggests the name Lycias, from the character in the Phædrus dialogue. Bob actually misunderstands this and assumes the nick-name Phædrus itself, though it has subsequently been pointed out many times that Phædrus has no connection with being wolf-like, meaning "one who shines brilliantly".
September / October 60 - It seems the professor must have been made aware of Bob's prior knowledge and alternative views and he gives the impression that he considers Phædrus initially to be eccentric, then undesirable, slightly mad, and finally completely insane. (Z25 p75 and p361/393)
October 61 - "Months" after the departure of the innocent student Phædrus ventures a personal opinion (Z25 p369) [Suggest in fact 7 or 8 weeks later in mid to late October.]
October / November 60 - The Professor is absent (mysteriously ill) for several weeks. (Z25 p382/384)
Early November 60 - The first snow of winter. (Z25 p383) Both teaching and studying hard for 20 hour days "in an effort to outflank the whole body of western academic thought" Phædrus is becoming exhausted. (Z25 p384)
2nd Week November 60 - After 4 weeks the Chairman (McKeon) turns up to take over the course. (Z25 p385) At the very first session the Chairman is undermined by Phædrus' contributions. Rhetoric 2 : Dialectic 0 (Z25 p385/390)
3rd Week November 60 - At the second session with the Chairman, Phædrus is deferential, but the Chairman is dismissive and Phædrus switches off. (Z25 p392)
3rd Week November 60 - At his next teaching session at Navy Pier (University of Illinois), which has been going very well to date, Phædrus is non-communicative. (Z25 p393)
24th November 60 - Thanksgiving comes (Z25 p393)

To save the situation it is Bob's father who obtains a court order to commit him to incarceration at the Veterans hospital in Minneapolis, where the therapy will include include EST (Electro-Convulsive Shock Therapy).
Nov 22, 1963 (The day of JFK's assassination) is one of twenty-eight occasions on which he receives EST, which eventually ends Phædrus (to reappear 5 years later on July 24th 1968) "He was dead. Destroyed by order of the court, enforced by the transmission of high-voltage alternating current through the lobes of his brain. Approximately 800 mills of amperage at durations of 0.5 to 1.5 seconds had been applied on twenty-eight consecutive occasions, in a process known technologically as Annihilation ECS. A whole personality had been liquidated without a trace in a technologically faultless act that has defined our relationship ever since. I (Pirsig) have never met him (Phædrus). Never will." (Z25 p91)
The start of Bob's recovery. After the shock treatments Bob sees that further direct pursuit of the Metaphysics of Quality will commit him institutionally for life, so he finally caves in and adopts his role as the narrator of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. (Bob has spent over two years in and out of of mental hospitals. (1974 NYT Interview). "What I am is a heretic who's recanted, and thereby in everyone's eyes saved his soul. Everyone's eyes but one, who knows deep down inside that all he has saved is his skin.")

January 73 - Landis confirms his support to get ZMM published in its final form, and the internal and external marketing effort this will take. "The book was sold to Morrow in January 1973".
April 73 - Landis makes his formal recommendation to the William Morrow editorial board, ending with the statement "This book is brilliant beyond belief, it is probably a work of genius, and will, I'll wager, attain classic stature." (Z25 Readers Guide p427)
Bob becomes a Board Member and Vice-President at the incorporation of a new Minnesota Zen Meditation Centre.
July / August 73 - Landis involves George Steiner as a reviewer. Steiner compares ZMM to Dostoyevsky, Broch, Proust and Bergson. Steiner recommends to the New Yorker that a review should support its publication. Landis considers Steiner's "stellar reputation" as very influential. (Landis 2nd Aug 1973, Z25 Readers Guide p429)
After 121 rejections, you only need one acceptance says Bob. (Z25 Readers Guide p432)

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