[MD] New UK edition of LILA

[Ant McWatt]

Dear All,

This September Alma Books are republishing LILA in the UK.  It is often 
forgotten that LILA was a 1992 Pulitzer fiction finalist despite its 
reputation as just being a rather depressing romantic novel filled with 
“intellectual digressions”.  Even without being published in the UK for 
years, Pirsig’s second text has still sold nearly 800,000 copies (not 
exactly a failure for a philosophy book - compare that to the fifty years it 
took John Hospers “Introduction to Philosophical Analysis” to sell just over 
150,000 copies.  A figure which Hosper’s publishing company thought was well 
worth advertising on the 21st century cover of his text!).

Alma is an independent publisher with an appropriate reputation for 
producing high quality books.  Their manifesto emphasizes that “alma,” 
Spanish for “soul,” is an apt name “for a company that regards a book as an 
aesthetic artefact rather than as a mass-produced commodity.” Alessandro 
Gallenzi, who founded Alma, underlines that a small publisher can focus 
properly on every step of production so this new UK edition of LILA should 
be an improvement not only on the Random House paperback (the only edition 
of LILA presently available) but even on the 1991 Bantam Press hardback.

Anyway, my congratulations to the Pirsigs and their busy publishing team at 
Pollinger.  Possibly, LILA was ahead of its time in 1991 but in this age 
where we increasingly need to develop a more Dynamic inclusive culture, 
maybe its time has finally come.  We shall see.  For anyone who would like a 
preview of the new cover, it can be seen at www.pollingerltd.com/news/index 
and at robertpirsig.org.

Chin, chin!

Anthony


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