The only Zen you find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there.
Source: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974), Ch. 20
“The only Zen you find on tops of mountains is the Zen you bring there.”
Source: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974), Ch. 20
Context: Zen is the "spirit of the valley." The only Zen you find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there.
“I just had to stay cool. Zen. No punching in the face. Punching would not be Zen.”
Source: Magic Bleeds
Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid (1979)
The Paris Review interview (1982)
Context: My Zen master, because I’ve studied Zen for a long time, told me that every one (and all the stories weren’t written then) of the Mary Poppins stories is in essence a Zen story. And someone else, who is a bit of a Don Juan, told me that every one of the stories is a moment of tremendous sexual passion, because it begins with such tension and then it is reconciled and resolved in a way that is gloriously sensual. … A great friend of mine at the beginning of our friendship (he was himself a poet) said to me very defiantly, “I have to tell you that I loathe children’s books.” And I said to him, “Well, won’t you just read this just for my sake?” And he said grumpily, “Oh, very well, send it to me.” I did, and I got a letter back saying: “Why didn’t you tell me? Mary Poppins with her cool green core of sex has me enthralled forever.”
Brisbane International 2016 http://www.smh.com.au/sport/tennis/brisbane-international-2016-federers-advice-to-kyrgios-and-tomic-twins-torment-and-other-stories-from-a-night-on-stage-with-sharapova-20160103-glyg4o.html
Japanese Death Poems. Compiled by Yoel Hoffmann. ISBN 978-0-8048-3179-6; Quoted in: Lawrence Winkler. Samurai Road. 2016. p. 25
