[MD] similar to ZAMM/Phaedrus/Pirsig?

[ARLO JAMES BENSINGER JR]

[alyosha]
I'm searching for a book or person similar to ZAMM/Phaedrus/Pirsig, and would love to hear your ideas.

[Arlo]
I'd *strongly* recommend FSC Northrop's "The Meeting of East and West".

"It's a text on Oriental philosophy and it's the most difficult book he's ever read. He's glad to be alone and bored in this empty troop compartment, otherwise he'd never get through it.

The book states that there's a theoretic component of man's existence which is primarily Western (and this corresponded to Phædrus' laboratory past) and an esthetic component of man's existence which is seen more strongly in the Orient (and this corresponded to Phædrus' Korean past) and that these never seem to meet. These terms "theoretic" and "esthetic" correspond to what Phædrus later called classic and romantic modes of reality and probably shaped these terms in his mind more than he ever knew. The difference is that the classic reality is primarily theoretic but has its own esthetics too. The romantic reality is primarily esthetic, but has its theory too. The theoretic and esthetic split is between components of a single world. The classic and romantic split is between two separate worlds. The philosophy book, which is called The Meeting of East and West, by F. S. C. Northrop, suggests that greater cognizance be made of the "undifferentiated aesthetic continuum" from which the theoretic arises." (ZMM)

If you're looking for more of a 'reflective travelogue', I'd suggest "Blue Highways" by William Least Heat-Moon. It probably doesn't go into formal philosophy (per se) as much as you seem to want, but the themes and topics are there.