Bartneck, C. (2019). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17613/1z00-q151

The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books
Christoph Bartneck
HIT Lab NZ, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealandchristoph.bartneck@canterbury.ac.nz
ORCID: 0000-0003-4566-4815

Abstract: The two books of Robert M. Pirsig have been milestones for Design
Theory through the development of a Metaphysics of Quality. This article
analyses the design history of his two books that have been in print for more than
40 years. The editions range from cheap mass-market paperbacks to gilded
collectors’ hardcovers. The underlying challenge for all book designs has been tocapture Pirsig’s philosophical ideas in a visually attractive and meaningful way.
This study also shows the publishing market consolidation. The book has been
published and printed by many imprints and printers that have lost their
independence. This results in a confusing number of reprints that occasionally
fail to receive unique ISBN numbers. Moreover, the advertised editions are often
not represented with their accurate cover design, which can be traced back to
imprecise stock photo databases.
Keywords: book design, book illustration, publishing, design history

Data availability statement:
The data for this article is available at https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5Introduction
Last year Robert Maynard Pirsig died aged 88 at his home in Maine. His work on the
Metaphysics of Quality (MOQ) influenced the discipline of Design like few others had.
He gave us the key to defining a true and unique Design Science by focusing it on
Quality. It thereby is no longer succumbed to engineering that focuses on the objects
being designed or succumbed to psychology that focuses on the people either creating
or using the objects. Design works at the intersection of objects and subjects, and the
MOQ defines this intersection as Quality. It would go beyond this article to fully
explain the relationship between MOQ and Design and the interested reader might
consult Bartneck (2009) for further details. The importance of this book extends far
beyond the field of Design. Its impact on science and society has been documented (seechapter 8 and 9 in DiSanto and Steele 1990).

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5Robert Pirsig introduced MOQ in his famous book Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle
Maintenance – An Inquiry Into Values (Pirsig 1974b), which is held to be one of themost widely read philosophy books. About 100,000 copies have been sold each year forthe last 20 years (Essinger and Gurr 2018). Pirsig made his philosophical ideas
accessible by embedding them into an autobiographical storyline and interweaving themin a travel journal of a motorcycle trip he took with his son Chris and two friends acrossthe United States in 1968. After being flooded with readers’ request for further
explanations, he wrote the sequel Lila – An Inquiry Into Morals (Adams 2005) tofurther elaborate on his MOQ (Pirsig 1991). The Guggenheim Foundation provided
Pirsig with a grant to support the writing of Lila. Pirsig himself considered Lila to be
the more important book, although it never reached the public success of his first book.
Millions of copies in many editions and reprints have been published over the years. In
this study I intend to document the design history of Pirsig’s books. Since the books are
partly autobiographical, it is also necessary to connect the story and the design of thebooks to his life. This is surprisingly difficult for such an acclaimed author, since Pirsig
lived a secluded life. Only on the rarest of occasions did he agree to an interview or apublic appearance. He also refrained from writing any further books and only a few
letters and lectures are available (Pirsig 1995, 2003).
As will become clear shortly, Pirsig lived an extraordinary life, in which he suffered
several tragedies and hardships. The writing and publication process of his first bookcontinued this line of misfortunes until it ended in an unexpected and overwhelming
success.
Life and work
Robert Maynard Pirsig was born on 6 September 1928 to his father Maynard Pirsig andto his mother Harriet Marie nee Sjobeck. He grew up in Minneapolis and scored 170 on
the Stanford–Binet Intelligence Test at the age of 9 1/2.
He started to take freshman courses in chemistry at the University of Minnesota in
1944, aged 15, but was expelled two years later due to failing grades, immaturity andinattention to studies. He then joined the army and experienced the end of World War IIin Korea. Pirsig returned to the US in 1948 and rejoined the University of Minnesota to
study philosophy, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in 1950. He then enrolled at the
Benares Hindu University to study oriental philosophy for 18 months before studying
journalism back in Minnesota.
He left the university without another degree and married Nancy Anne James in 1954.
They had two sons – Chris, born in 1956, and Theodore, born in 1958. That same year
he completed his journalism studies with a master’s degree and the following year
began teaching English at the Montana State College in Bozeman.
His work on Quality started as he experimented with new teaching methods for English
composition. He continued his education towards a PhD in 1961 at the University of
Chicago in the “Analysis of Ideas and Study of Methods” program, with the goal tofocus his work on Quality.
His deep dedication to Quality while working as a teacher at the University of Illinois
resulted in a complete mental breakdown towards the end of 1961. Pirsig was
hospitalised but returned to his family a year later before being hospitalised again in
1963 at the Veterans Hospital in Minneapolis. This time he was stripped of his civilrights by a court order and exposed to Electro-Convulsive Shock Therapy, which

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

largely erased his memories and personality. He began his recovery and started working
as a technical writer.
The idea of writing a book, possibly about Quality, stayed with him and he submitted abook proposal to 122 publishers in 1968. Twenty-two expressed an initial interest andPirsig started to work with James Landis of William Morrow on his first book Zen And
The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance – An Inquiry Into Values (ZAMM). In the same
year he took a motorcycle trip with his son Chris and two friends, which became one of
the three storylines in the book. The second storyline was based on his experiences
starting from teaching at Montana State University until his breakdown in 1961. The
third storyline was a philosophical essay on Quality which was his intellectual goal
leading up to his breakdown.
He continued to write throughout the next years, with several drafts being written anddiscarded. The writing took place during the early morning hours, while he kept his fulltime day job as a technical writer. The manuscript was completed in 1973 and publisheda year later.
Pirsig and his wife learnt how to sail and he bought a sail boat. In 1975 he took the boat
down the Hudson River to New York and then further down the Atlantic coast to
Miami. The section of this trip between Kingston (New York) and Sandy Hook,
Horseshoe Cove, (Highlands of Navesink) became the basis for the storyline in his
second book Lila – An Inquiry into Morals (Lila), which he starts working on that same
year. In 1976, Pirsig met Wendy Kimball, a freelance journalist, and they continued tolive together on the boat. Pirsig and his wife Nancy divorced in 1978 and their son Chris
was murdered on 17 November 1979 near Haight/Octavia in San Francisco.
Pirsig and Wendy subsequently sailed across the Atlantic and remained in Europe,
where their daughter Nell was born in 1981. Four years later, the family returned to the
US for Nell to start kindergarten. In 1991 the first edition of Lila was published but
Pirsig and his family were by then becoming increasingly private, although Pirsig gave
a few interviews and attended two conferences. On 24 April 2017, he died at his homein Maine.
Definitions
The printing technology and the book have evolved dramatically during the past
decades. From Pirsig’s first book in 1974 to today’s available books, the production
methods, the publishers and the printers have all changed. It is therefore necessary todefine the terms used in this article to talk about the books.
The publisher is the organisation which holds the copyright or licence to the book andwhich oversees their production and distribution. Pirsig’s books were originallypublished by William Morrow and Company, but they have been licensed for printing
to many other publishers, including Bantam or Alma Books. A considerable
consolidation of publishers occurred in the past decades and most smaller publishers
were bought or merged with competitors, resulting in five large publishing houses:
Penguin Random House, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Hachette Book Group andMacmillan.
While the ownership of the publishing houses shifted, the brands often remained intact
and the publishers often refer to them as imprints. Penguin Random House, forexample, maintains nearly 250 imprints, such as Penguin Books, Bantam and Vintage
Books.

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5The exact history of the mergers and purchases is far too convoluted to disentangle
them in this study. What is more important is to notice that several different publishinghouses published Pirsig’s books under different imprints. A publisher might use
external printers to produce the books. With Pirsig’s books only sometimes are external
printers explicitly mentioned, such as Cox & Wyman Ltd or Clays Ltd. In otherinstances, the printer is only named as an acronym in the printer's key (see Figure 1),such as OPM referring to Offset Paperback Manufacturers, which is owned by the
Bertelsmann Printing Group.

Figure 1: Printer's key. This key refers to a 3rd impression was printed by RR Donnelley in 2005

Publishers print books in batches often referred to as impressions. The same printing
plates were reused to simply produce more copies of the same book. The impression ofa book can be deduced from the printer’s key, which consists of a line of numbers on
the book’s copyright page. As a rule of thumb, the lowest number in the printer’s key
identifies the impression of the book (see Figure 1). With the arrival of digital printing,the use of the printer’s key has fallen out of fashion.
In this study I distinguish between editions of Pirsig’s book. These editions show
significant differences in terms of design and content. An edition might, for example,
feature a new cover and foreword. In most cases, a new edition also has a new
International Standard Book Number (ISBN), but this is not always the case. The
original 1974 edition of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, for example,
shares its ISBN number with its 25th anniversary edition published in 1999.
Books usually first come to the market as hardcovers with a dust jacket, followed laterby cheaper paperbacks. I do not distinguish between the hardcover and paperback
version of an edition as long as the design of the book is identical. Only one bookappeared as a hardcover and paperback within the same edition [21].
Table 1 shows that metadata for all editions in chronological order. For the purpose of
the discussions in this article, I have given each edition a unique identification number,in square brackets, which I will refer to. The identification number matches the entry inthe tables which refer to the online supplementary material.
Source Data
For the purpose of this book I scanned the covers of almost all English editions. I
digitally restored the resulting images to remove any damages and signs of use. I also
colour corrected the scans and merged the front, spine and back cover into one image. I
also digitised the copyright page and the first page of chapter one. The resulting images
and a table with all the metadata is available at the Open Science Framework(https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5).
Design of Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle MaintenanceI have been able to identify 21 editions of this book (see Table 1). This comprises six
hardcover editions, 14 paperback editions and one edition that appeared as hardcoverand paperback at the same time. One of the hardcovers appeared as a limited edition andanother as a special edition. I will work through these books in chronological order.

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

The first edition of ZAMM [1] was published in 1974 in the US by William Morrow asa hardcover with a dust jacket (see Figure 2). The book was designed by Helen Roberts
while the cover was designed by Paul Bacon. The cover uses white text on a black
background that is framed with a silver border. The illustration of a plant, possibly a
lotus (Nelumbo nucifera), dominates the centre of the cover. The lotus plant has a strong
symbolic meaning in many Eastern religions and hence matches Pirsig’s goal ofconnecting Eastern and Western philosophy. This merger is further emphasised byvisualising the blossom as a spanner. The spanner is a standard tool for motorcycle
maintenance and symbolizes rational thinking. The shape of the spanner and the shapeof a lotus match in terms of their outline consisting of a slim stalk and an oval blossom.
The greenery at the bottom of the illustration does not match the shape of the roundlotus leaves and we have to assume some level of artistic licence.

Figure 2: The original cover of ZAMM [1]The Bodoni typeface, designed by Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813), gives the cover aclassical appearance, since this typeface design follows the aesthetical ideas of the 18thand 19th century. The spine continues the silver border on which the text is set in black
colour while the back features the conventional black on white text. The dust cover does
not contain a photo of the author.
In a radio interview Pirsig explained that the publisher intended to market Pirsig as amystery man (Pirsig 1974a). The typeface for the book itself is likely Times New
Roman which was designed by Stanley Morison (1889-1967) in 1932 for the British
newspaper The Times. The overall design of the cover and the book interior is very
classical and elegant, even conservative. The design did not use any psychedelic art, as
would have been fashionable at the time and which has been used in later editions.
Against the custom of the times, the typeface used in the book is not mentioned in the
copyright page. The Library of Congress categorised the book as autobiographical,

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

which does not seem to do justice to the philosophical essay it contains. The Library ofCongress cataloguing in publication data shown on this page omits the subtitle “AnInquiry Into Values”, while the online record of the library does include the full title1.
In the same year, The Bodley Head published the book [2] in the United Kingdom as ahardcover with a dust jacket which was printed by Redwood Burns Ltd. The interior
book is identical to the US version [1], but the cover is a complete new design by John
Swell. The front cover shows an ancient Greek leaning on a motorcycle in a thinking
pose. His left gloved hand holds a spanner and a lotus plant is growing from his hair.
The blossom is now clearly identifiable as a lotus while the shapes of the leaves remain
ambiguous. The book begins with the sentence, “I can see by my watch, without taking
my hand from the left grip of the cycle…”. Later in the book Pirsig even describes his
gloves in great detail. Swell’s choice to fit a glove on the left hand of the Greek man
hence seems appropriate.
The author’s name and the title of the book are arranged above this figure. It isinteresting to note that the subtitle “An Inquiry Into Values” is omitted from the coverand the copyright page. This omission on the cover occurs in six other editions[4,12,14,15,16,17]. The cover uses the sans-serif Univers typeface designed by Adrian
Frutiger (1928-2015). It was published by Deberny & Peignot in 1957. The whole front
cover uses only three colours: black, yellow and green. The cover could therefore be
printed by not using the CMYK process but rather a dedicated three-colour print.
The back cover shows a full-page, black-and-white photograph of Pirsig with his son
Chris sitting on their Honda CB77 Super Hawk motorcycle2. The photo was taken
during their 1968 trip across the US. In the previous edition [1], Pirsig remained hidden,
but this cover shows him across the full page. Many books offer a photograph of theauthor, but this is often done on the inner flaps of their dust jacket. The motorcycle
illustration shown on the front does not match that of the Honda CB77 but represents a
more generic motorcycle. Swell took a more modern and personal approach to the cover
design than in the previous edition [1].
A year after its initial release, Bantam Books published the first [3] in a long series of
paperback editions of the book that differ mainly in their colouration [3,5,7,8]. The
cover uses the initial lotus spanner illustration introduced in [1] on top. Below, the titleof the book is arranged with many line breaks, resulting in a pyramid composition. The
title uses the Bodoni typeface again, but this time the more accentuated Monotype
Bodoni Poster Compressed version is used. The back cover uses the bold slogan - “Themost explosive book you will read this year”. The back cover features a landscapeillustration. A man and a child he has his arm around are standing with their backs to us
in front of their motorcycle looking towards the mountains in the distance. The
relationship of this illustration to Pirsig’s journey requires no further explanation. It is
likely that the cover was printed on coloured paper using only black and red ink. All
further colour variations of this cover can then be achieved by printing on different
coloured paper. The book itself had to be typeset in a new design due to the smaller
dimensions of the book, which results in a page count of 406.

1

https://lccn.loc.gov/73012275

2

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/cycle-zen-art-and-motorcyclemaintenance-comes-smithsonian-180973836/

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

The first UK paperback version was published in 1976 by Corgi [4], an imprint ofTransworld Publishers, and it was printed by Hazel Watson & Viney Ltd. Transworld
Publishers was established as the British division of Bantam Books. The interior uses
the same design as its American predecessor [3] and even explicitly mentions the Times
typeface for the book’s text. The cover reverses the spanner-lotus relationship. This
time the spanner is the root of the lotus plant and the illustration is placed on the left
side of the cover. The blossom is now more clearly identifiable as a lotus. The spannerhas two casting impressions. The 5/16W refers to the 5/16 inch British Standard
Whitworth (BSW) size while the 3/8BSF impression refers to the 3/8 inch British
Standard Fine, which is a fine-pitch alternative to the BSW. These imperial sizes were,and possibly still are, widely used in motorcycle and automotive maintenance in the
UK. Honda, however, is a Japanese company which uses the metric system. Moreover,in the book Pirsig describes how he is using his metric sockets and box-ends. The
illustration would have been closer to the content of the book if a metric spanner had
been depicted. The cover is split into two columns with the illustration on the left andthe typography on the right.
The title omits the book’s subtitle again and makes the even bolder claim, “The most
explosive book you will ever read!”, on the back cover. It almost appears that the
British editions seemed to be caught in an arms race with the American editions inpraising the book.
In 1979 William Morrow released its own paperback version [6] under its imprint Quill.
The book design is the same as their hardcover edition [1]. Only the cover was updated
slightly, with new endorsements on the back and an adapted layout on the spine.
Two years later Bantam published a New Age Edition of its paperback series [7]. The
main difference is the colouration of the front cover to pink and the New Age Books
logo on the back. The New Age Books logo features a rainbow illustration which will
have required a full CMYK colour printing process. It is interesting to note that the
publisher decided to market the book as “new age” instead of “philosophy” or“autobiography”. Given that the New Age Movement is associated with many irrational
and unscientific ideas, it does seem inappropriate to link these ideas to Pirsig’s chase of
the ghosts of rationality. The interior has a complete new design that reduced the pagecount to 380. The book was printed by Offset Paperback Manufacturers (OPM) which isowned today by the Bertelsmann Printing Group.
To mark the 10th anniversary of the book in 1984, William Morrow published ananniversary edition as a paperback [10] and as a limited edition [9]. The later was
limited to 1000 copies and each was signed by the author. Pirsig wrote a new afterword,
which tells not only the story of Chris’ murder, but also the story of Nell’s birth. The
afterword thereby offers a rare insight into Pirsig’s private life. The front cover is
identical to [1], while the spine has some similarity to [6]. It does excludes the author’sname and features the William Morrow logo instead of the Quill logo. The back cover
only differs from [1] by the spacing of the last two lines of text, which is due to thesmaller size of the cover. The book interior design is again by Helen Roberts using theoriginal layout [1].
In the same year, Bantam updated its paperback with only minor changes to the cover[8], and even the colouration remained the same as the 1981 edition [7]. The New Age
Books logo is now also included on the spine and on the top left of the front cover.
In 1989 a Black Swan edition was printed in the UK [11] that is very similar to the
Corgi edition of 1976 [4]. Black Swan is another imprint of Transworld Publishers Ltd

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

mentioned above. The two columns design is now even more pronounced byintroducing a colour contrast. The illustration remains unchanged on a blue background,while the right column is now blue text on a white background. The 10th anniversary
edition afterword of the author introduced in [8,9] is explicitly advertised on the front
cover. The back makes again bold claims, this time in the form of an endorsement by
Newsweek: “The most explosive detective story of high ideas in years”. The interior is acompletely new design using the Mallard typeface. The book was set by Colset Private
Limited (Singapore) and printed by The Guernsey Press Co. Ltd., located in Guernsey
on the Channel Islands. No further information about the typeface, the typesetter nor the
printing company is available. The Guernsey Press is a newspaper today and it isunclear when and how they were involved in printing books.
In the same year, Vintage Publishing, an imprint of Penguin Random House, released
another paperback version [12]. The cover was illustrated by Dirk Van Dooren and thecover was designed by The Senate with photographs taken by Michael Ormerod. The
cover features a large ball bearing on top and a photograph of a motorcyclist on an open
road. It is unlikely a photograph of Pirsig and Chris since Ormerod was specificallymentioned on the cover and he was certainly not part of Pirsig’s original tour. The book
was printed by Cox & Wyman Ltd. which is today part of CPI Books. The book interior
was set in Sabon Typeface by Falcon Typographic Art Ltd in a complete new design,
which resulted in a 424-page book.
In 1999 William Morrow and Company published a 25th anniversary edition as ahardcover [13]. The cover is very similar to the original 1974 edition [1]. Only a callout
for the anniversary edition and a notification about a new introduction have been added.
The spine uses a new layout that is based on the front cover design. The back cover now
also uses the black background and silver border as seen on the front cover. The interior
design is identical to that of the original edition [1] with only the addition of the newforeword. The last pages of chapter 31 start to show parts of the text set in a sans-serif
typeface. The complete last chapter 32 is set in the same sans-serif typeface. This could
be explained by the potential degeneration of the original printing plates which were
only partially replaced. It is unclear why the publisher decided to use a completely
different typeface. A replacement with the original Times New Roman would have
easily been possible.
Vintage Publishing released a 25th anniversary paperback in the same year that featured
an extensive reading guide [14]. This guide included an introduction text, email
correspondence between Pirsig and his editor James Landis, and an interview with theauthor. This reading guide is not included in the hardcover edition of the same year[13]. The interior is a completely new design that resulted in 432 pages, including thereading guide. The book was printed by the CPI Group and Randy Ruten created thecover illustration. For the first time, the cover is designed in the psychedelic style thatwas popular during the period of Pirsig’s original motorcycle tour in San Francisco. The
ornamented title on the cover is warped similarly to the work of Wes Wilson’s famous
posters. The cover uses a high colour contrast between the red title text and dark blue
background. The spine features a scaled down cover illustration besides a more
traditional title and author text. The back cover shows endorsements in white serif
typeface on the dark blue background.
In 2001 Easton Press published a luxurious leather-bound collector’s edition [15]. This
edition was signed by the author and contains an authenticity certificate. The book is
accented in 22-carat gold and printed on archival paper with gilded edges (see Figure 3).
The title and author is only printed on the spine. The front and back cover show golden

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

ornaments in a frieze pattern. The interior of the book uses the original design by Helen
Roberts [1]. This book does not contain an ISBN number and it is unclear how many
copies of the book were printed. Unlike other special editions, these books are notserialised. A customer representative from Eason Press confirmed that the publisher
does not release the number of copies printed.

Figure 3: Collectors’ Edition by Easton Press [15]Vintage Publishing released a new paperback edition in 2004 [16] that shares its ISBN
number with the 1999 edition [14]. Furthermore, this book features the same readers’guide and has the same page numbers. The interior is identical to [14] and hence thisbook edition could be considered a reprint. The printer, however, was Clays Ltd, one of
the largest printers in the UK at that time. Clays was sold to Elcograf in 2018, which isanother indicator of the strong market consolidation in the printing industry. The covershows the shadow of a lotus blossom in the lower half, on which a psychedelicallystyled title is shown (see ). The solid purple background and the sans-serif author’sname on the top right are in contrast a very modern and simple design. The spine andback cover also follow a very sober, modern and simplistic style.

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

Figure 4: A psychedelic design of ZAMM [16]Vintage Publishing released the 40th anniversary edition in the same year [17]. The
cover design is dominated by a photograph of a vintage motorcycle that is not a Honda
CB77 Superhawk that Pirsig used for his trip. The photograph is colourised in red andsplits across a grid of three by five tiles. The title of the book is positioned at the very
top of the cover while the author’s name is below the illustration. The back cover uses
some tiles from the front and mixes them with blocks of text that describe the book’s
content. The content of the book and its design is identical to [16]. The book was also
printed by Clays Ltd. It is unclear why Vintage Publishing released two paperback
editions in the same year with identical content.
In 2005 HarperCollins published a paperback edition of the book that was printed by
RR Donnelley [18]. The book appeared in the Harper Perennial Modern Classics series.
The cover was designed by Mary Schuck using Paul Bacon’s original illustration. The
design of the cover uses the Monotype’s Century Gothic sans-serif typeface, which was
released in 1991. This geometric typeface, combined with the centred composition of
the text and the use of only two muted colors, gave the cover a very modern and simple
appearance. The interior uses the same readers’ guide introduced in [14] but with acomplete new interior design that resulted in a 464-page count using the Garamondtypeface.
HarperCollins published a hardcover in the same year which was again printed by RR
Donnelley [19]. The copyright page of this book shows the same ISBN number as [17]while the cover shows a different ISBN number. Furthermore, many sources list
Perfection Learning as the publisher of this book while the copyright page lists
HarperCollins. Perfection Learning does not seem to be an imprint of HarperCollins. It
is a rather a publisher that specialises in library editions.

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5The interior design is identical to [18]. It is conceivable that Perfection Learning target
libraries with this edition and reused the design of [18]. The cover was designed by
Marc Cohen. The cover is similar in style as [1] but uses the Bodoni Condensed
typeface. The name of the author is set in all lowercase. The spine has a white stripe on
black background across the book. The title of the book is set in a sans-serif typeface in
all-capitals while the author’s name is set in the serif typeface Bodoni in all lower-case.
The back cover is split into two columns. The left column uses white text on a black
background while the right reverses this colour schema. The left column shows
endorsements while the right introduces the author. The thick cardboard and robust
binding makes this book a good candidate for libraries.
In 2006 HarperCollins published another paperback edition under their Harper Torch
imprint [20]. The cover shows Paul Beacon’s original illustration while the whole coveruses a modern sans-serif typeface, possibly Helvetica Neue, using all capital letters.
This typeface was published in 1983 by Linotype. The style of the cover is very
simplistic and modern using turquoise colours. The book was printed in the US by the
QGM printer. It is unclear what the acronym QGM in the printers’ line stands for. The
new interior design results in 540 pages, which makes this edition one of the smallest interms of height and width, but it is much thicker than earlier mass-market editions.
William Morrow and Company published a hardcover and paperback edition in 2008[21] with identical covers. They were designed by Milan Bozic using Beacon’s originalillustration as a starting point. The illustration is now reduced to an outline in lightgreen on a darker green uniform background. The title and author’s name are all set in
the Futura typeface using all capitals. Only the subtitle “An Inquiry into Values” uses
the title case. Futura was designed by Paul Renner in 1927 and is a prime example of ageometric sans-serif typeface. The cover design is even more simplistic than [18].
The back cover does not even contain any endorsement but a single quote from the bookset in all capitals: “THE SOLUTIONS ALL ARE SIMPLE … AFTER YOU’VE
ALREADY ARRIVED AT THEM. BUT THEY’RE SIMPLE ONLY WHEN YOU
ALREADY KNOW WHAT THEY ARE”. Towards the end of the book the typesetting
does become unusual as first seen in [13]. As of page 407, sans-serif text is mixed inwith the serif typeface of the rest of the book. As of page 409, the remaining text is all
set in sans-serif. This may indicate that the original printing plates had worn out andthat a few new ones were created. In 2008 digital printing technology was alreadywidely available and it would have been easy for William Morrow and Company todesign a complete new layout for the book’s interior.

Publisher

Easton Press

Vintage Publishing

Vintage Publishing

HarperCollins

HarperCollins

Harper TorchWilliam Morrow and Company

15 2001

16 2004

17 2004

18 2005

19 2005

20 2006

21 2008

William Morrow and Company

Vintage Publishing

12 1989

Vintage Publishing

Black Swan

11 1989

13 1999

William Morrow and Company

14 1999

William Morrow and Company

9 1984

Bantam Books

8 198410 1984

Quill William Morrow

Bantam Books

6 19797 1981

Corgi

Bantam

4 1976

5 1976The Bodley Head Ltd

Bantam Books

2 1974

3 1975

William Morrow and Company

Year

1 1974ID

Edition10th Anniversary Edition

25th Anniversary Edition
Collectors Edition

9780060589462

Perfection Learning

9780060839871 Harper Perennial Modern Classics

9780099598169 40th Anniversary Edition

9780099786405

9780099322610 25th Anniversary Edition

9780099786405

9780552993784 Black Swan Edition

9780688032074 10th Anniversary Edition

9780553257489

9780553277470 New Age Edition

9780688052300

9780553103106

9780552101660

9780553207088

9780062008930 9780061673733

9780756902407

9780688002305

9780688032074

9780370103389

9780688002305

Hardcover ISBN Paperback ISBN

14.6

10.5

13.5

13.5

12.8

12.8

20.32

12.9

14.5

12.9

12.7

14

10.5

10.5

13.5

10.5

10.5

10.5

14.5

14.2

21.6

17.1

20.7

20.3

19.8

19.8

22.86

19.9

21.6

19.8

19.7

19.7

17.5

17.5

20.8

17.5

17.8

17.7

22.3

21.4

3.5

3.1

3.2

2.8

2.8

2.7

3.4

2.7

3.6

2.7

2.3

2.8

2.8

2.8

3.1

2.8

2.8

2.3

3.6

4.1

418

540

430

464

404

432

418

432

418

424

416

412

380

380

418

406

416

406

412

411

URL

1 https://osf.io/mexsg/

8 https://osf.io/7fspt/

7 https://osf.io/kzhfd/

7 https://osf.io/h4sne/

5 https://osf.io/qv9bc/

5 https://osf.io/mhevt/

1 https://osf.io/pq9td/

5 https://osf.io/58pue/

1 https://osf.io/8tcmh/

6 https://osf.io/ay8w4/4 https://osf.io/s7ygj/

1 https://osf.io/xfuzc/

1 https://osf.io/tg94x/

3 https://osf.io/6b3y7/

3 https://osf.io/u9wbn/

1 https://osf.io/b3rzj/

2 https://osf.io/2f4y7/

2 https://osf.io/dnb24/

2 https://osf.io/5twz3/

1 https://osf.io/ky6xb/

1 https://osf.io/djevm/

Width Height Depth Pages Design

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5Table 1: Editions Of Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle MaintenanceBartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5Design of Lila
There are currently nine editions of Lila – An Inquiry Into Morals. Four of them are
hardcovers and five are paperbacks. Two of the hardcovers are limited editions with slip
cases. The cover designs will be presented in chronological order.
Lila was first published in 1991 in three hardcover editions. Bantam Press, an imprint ofTransworld Publishers, had its UK edition printed by Mackays of Chatham [1]. It was
set in the Bembo typeface that was released in 1928 by Monotype. This results in a pagecount of 418 pages.

Figure 5: The original cover of Lila [1]The cover was designed by Bill Gregory, showing an illustration of a key on the left thatmorphs into a butterfly at its bow (see Figure 5). There is no clear match between theillustration and common butterfly species in North America, but with a bit of artistic
licence the butterfly could be interpreted to be an “American Lady” (Vanessa
virginiensis). The Butterfly and Moth Information Network concluded that the image
includes elements from multiple unrelated species. The bit has the texture of a printed
circuit board (PCB). The grey key is set against a black background which takes half ofthe cover.
The symbolism in this illustration is difficult to decipher. The PCB texture could referto the classical quality Pirsig introduced in ZAMM. The butterfly could represent themetamorphoses of the Lila character in the story, in relation to her becoming
increasingly detached from reality. On the right half, the title and author’s name is set inblack on a white background. The text reminds us that Pirsig is also the author of
ZAMM. The spine has again white text on black background that continues around tothe back. There, the key illustration is repeated on the right with the endorsements
placed on the left.

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5The US edition was printed by Berryville Graphics, which belongs to the Bertelsmann
Printing Group [2]. It uses a different cover and book design. The cover is dominated by
the large title and author’s name on a white background. In the middle a small
illustration of a swallow is placed. Its outline is filled with the view on an ocean. On its
horizon the silhouette of a sailing boat is shown. The photo of the sailboat is by Jeff
Cook and the dust jacket design is by One Plus One Studio. The front cover again refers
to Pirsig’s previous ZAMM book while the back cover contains only endorsements. The
spine shows only the author’s name, the short title “Lila”, and the swallow illustration.
Claire Vaccaro designed the book interior, which results in 409 pages.
Claire Vaccaro’s book design was also used for the third edition of 1991 [3]. The
limited edition was signed and enumerated by the author and had a print run of 375
copies. The black cloth slipcase had a gilded swallow on the front. The book was clothbound with gilded lettering on the spine and a gilded swallow on the front. The edges ofthe book were also gilded.
In 1992 Bantam published its first UK paperback edition [4], printed by Cox & Wyman
Ltd. Bantam classified the book as being part of its Black Swan editions. The cover issimilar to [1] and, instead of the Bantam logo, a small black swan logo is placed at thebottom of the front cover. An endorsement from the New York Times also found its way
on to the front cover. The illustration on the back cover was replaced with the text fromthe dust jacket [1] and new endorsements are shown on the left. The interior bookdesign uses a new layout using the Melior typeface, designed by Hermann Zapf in 1952
for the Linotype company.

ID

Publisher

HardcoverISBN

Bantam Press

Bantam Press

Bantam Press

Alma Books

Alma Books

Alma Books

4 19925 19926 19927 20068 20069 2011

9781846880131

9780553078732

Bantam Press 9780553077377

Bantam2 1991

3 1991

Bantam Press 9780593025079

Year

1 1991

9781846881541

9781846880117

9780553180978

9780553299618

9780552995047

PaperbackISBN

Limited Edition

12.7

Black Swan Edition

12.8

12.7

14.6

10.6

10.6

15.7

15.8

16

19.2

19.7

22.4

17.5

17.5

19.7

24.1

24.2

23.9

2.9

3

3.9

3.4

3.4

2.6

3.3

3.3

3.8

439

443

445

468

468

476

409

409

418

URL

6 https://osf.io/uz5vt/

5 https://osf.io/venc2/

5 https://osf.io/y4tks/

4 https://osf.io/h698j/

4 https://osf.io/p39z7/

3 https://osf.io/6rmah/

2 https://osf.io/jeyud/

2 https://osf.io/7ehwm/

1 https://osf.io/fw5ua/

Width Height Depth Pages Design

Limited Edition

EditionBartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5Table 2: Editions of LilaIn the same year Bantam also published its US paperback [5]. It was printed by Offset
Paperback Manufacturers which belongs to the Bertelsmann Group. The front cover isBartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

similar to [2] but is now using white letters on a turquoise background. The spine uses
the same elements which are now oriented vertically. The back cover features the
typical endorsement but also includes the swallow illustration and the title of the bookin a large typeface. The interior is different from its UK counterpart [4] and results in
468 pages. Bantam published another paperback in the same year [6] as an international
edition that was printed in the US by RAD. The cover differs from [5] only in the
choice of colours and the embossed text. It uses white text on a dark blue background.
The interior book design is identical to [5].
Alma Books published a limited and signed hardcover edition in 2006 [7]. The book
was printed by The National Press in Jordan. The black slip case features a gildedbutterfly besides the title and author’s name. The book itself has gilded text on the spine
but is otherwise plain black. The interior has a new layout which results in a page countof 445.
Alma Books also published a paperback in the same year [8]. It was printed by Cox andWayman Ltd. and the cover was designed by Transmission-UK. Its design is based on
the gilded butterfly on black ground of the limited edition. It features a gold-like effectachieved through gradients within the lettering. The cover is, however, printed in
CMYK. In the middle of a cover is a top view of a golden monarch butterfly (Danaus
plexippus).
Alma Books continued to publish Lila editions in 2011 with a paperback that was
printed by CPI Cox & Wyman Ltd [9]. It includes an introduction by the author. Theinterior layout is almost identical to [7,8] which results in a page count of 439. Only
titles for the parts have been added. The cover design is in the psychedelic style. The
text on the front, spine and back combine to form an outline in the shape of a butterfly.
The white, red and orange text is set against a black background.

Figure 6: Screenshot of a re-seller advertising an Alma Book Edition with an unavailable
cover.

Bartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5Alma Books seems to advertise another edition with the same ISBN number as [9] butthat has a cover that uses another colour palette (see Figure 6). An order of this book
was fulfilled with a book that has a cover which is almost identical to [9]. It did nothave the orange background design, but features a slightly more glossy print. Anotherambiguous edition is the one with the ISBN number 9780553078732. None of the mainbooksellers show an actual cover for this book and the book delivered from ordering
this book was usually one of the mass-market paperbacks.
Conclusions
The two books of Robert M. Pirsig have been in print for a long time and are an ideal
starting point from which to observe the changing design and publishing world. ZAMM
in particular has been produced in a variety of formats - from affordable mass-market
paperbacks to gilded collectors’ editions.
The mass-market paperbacks are optimised for affordability and often use only colour
variations for new covers. The exclusive limited and signed editions showcase the art ofbook making. The limited editions of ZAMM are far more expensive than similar
quality editions of Lila, which cannot be explained by their age alone. Pirsig evenclaimed that Lila is the more important book in an NPR radio interview (Adams 2005).
It would appear that ZAMM has been more of a culture bearer than Lila although thelatter was conceived to be an explanation of the first. Lila certainly offers a moredetailed account of the Metaphysics of Quality.
All book cover artists struggled with giving a face to Pirsig’s philosophical ideas of
Quality. Several approaches can be identified.
The first of these is a focus on the book’s metadata such as the title, author and subtitle.
Many editions omit illustrations or decorations and take a minimalistic approach. The
first editions of ZAMM even omitted a photograph of the author. According to the NPRinterview, the marketing approach was to present Pirsig as a mystery author (Pirsig
1974a). Given Pirsig’s reclusive lifestyle, this seems to have been a fitting approach.
Secondly, a psychedelic style is used to represent the popular culture of the time inwhich the story takes place. While Pirsig’s first motorcycle trip did indeed take place inthe late 1960s, ZAMM itself was published in 1974. It contains a reflection on why the
hippy movement failed. Lila was published in 1991 and hence the psychedelic styleseems to refer more to ZAMM, which is often mentioned on the cover of Lila.
Thirdly, the contrast between the classical and romantic Quality is revealed by symbols
of technology and nature. The wrench, circuit board and ball bearing are examples ofengineering precision. The lotus plant, butterfly and swallow are instantiations of
nature. The design challenge is to show not the difference between classical andromantic quality, but their union. Hence the wrench grows out of the flower plant andthe key morphs into a butterfly.
Lastly, the book covers show the means of transportation used in the stories.
Motorcycles are shown for ZAMM and sailing boats for Lila. This design choice
focuses on the autobiographical account of Pirsig’s journeys, but they fail to capture theessence of the Metaphysics of Quality. Pirsig in the first page of ZAMM even notes that
his book is not very factual on motorcycles. The covers of this type have been rather
inaccurate, since none of them show the Honda CB77 Super Hawk motorcycle that
Pirsig used for his road trip. Instead, the covers show vintage motorcycles that areBartneck, C. (2020). The Design History of Robert M. Pirsig’s Books. Humanities Commons. | DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/U9WX5

difficult to identify. That may be because the publisher had to try to avoid using
copyright protected material.
This study also discovered several practical challenges that are possibly based on thechanging book economy. Many of the publishers and printers that released Pirsig’s
books have lost their independence and have become imprints of ever bigger media
conglomerates. The complex web of mergers and takeovers is difficult to follow and is asign of the dramatic market consolidation that took place. William Morrow andCompany, the original publisher of the books, was founded in 1926 and acquired by
Scott Foresman in 1967. It was then sold to Hearst Corporation in 1981 and News Corp
in 1999. Today William Morrow is an imprint of HarperCollins which is one of the big
five publishers. The publishers mentioned on the cover or the copyright page are
therefore often no longer active as a separate entity.
The ever-changing publishing world also resulted in the book being sold by different
publishers in different editions, but with identical International Standard Book Number(ISBN) numbers. This defeats the purpose of the ISBN numbers as being a unique
identifier. This ambiguity makes tracing the editions challenging, in particular since
many resellers use stock photography covers that do not represent the actual covers of
the books.
Often sellers did not bother to accurately identify their books. Several orders made forthe purpose of this article resulted in the delivery of the wrong editions. The mostchallenging edition was the 10th anniversary limited edition of ZAMM [9], which isonly available in the second-hand market for at least $US400. The only library holding
this book is the Sonoma State University Library, which stores a copy in its rare bookcollection. Unfortunately, the library has been unable to provide high resolution scansof the book and neither is it able to make it available via an interloan.
Limitations
This study only considered the English language version of the books and an analysis of
the many other language versions would certainly be an interesting topic ofinvestigation. Additional funding would be necessary to acquire the necessary editions.
It would have been ideal to include the artwork directly in this manuscript but tracing
the copyrights of all the editions across the maze of publishers and imprints exceeds theability of the author. All the book covers, slipcases, copyright pages and the first text
page are therefore archived at the Open Science Framework Repository3. The artwork
was carefully scanned and digitally restored.
References
Adams, Noah. 2005. "Robert Pirsig Discusses 'Lila: An Inquiry into Morals'." In
National Public Radio. NPR.
Bartneck, Christoph. 2009. "Notes on design and science in the HCI community."
Design Issues 25 (2):46-61. doi: 10.1162/desi.2009.25.2.46.
DiSanto, Ronald L., and Thomas J. Steele. 1990. Guidebook to Zen and the art of
motorcycle maintenance. New York: W. Morrow.

3

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Essinger, James, and Henry Gurr. 2018. A Woman of Quality: Sarah Vinke, ‘The Divine
Sarah’, and the Quest for the Origin or Robert Pirsig’s Metaphysics of Quality,
in his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: Theory of Mind
Publishing Company.
Pirsig, Robert M. 1974a. "'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Author' Robert
Pirsig." In, edited by Connie Goldman. NPR.
———. 1974b. Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance: an inquiry into values.
New York: Morrow.
———. 1991. Lila : an inquiry into morals. New York: Bantam Books.
———. 1995. Subjects, Objects, Data & Values. Paper presented at the Einstein meets
Magritte Symposium, Vrije University Brussels.
———. 2003. "Letter to Paul Turner dated September 23rd 2003." In.