Hardcore Zen: Punk Rock Monster Movies & the Truth About Reality [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

The last thing Buddha reportedly told his followers was to question authority, which is something Warner, as bass player in an Ohio hardcore band and later a toiler on Japanese B-movies, could relate to. Oh, he studied with a Zen master in Japan, too, but pretty obviously, he isn't your typical Buddhist priest, and Hardcore Zen isn't your typical Buddhist book. Warner brings the same tough, skeptical attitude to Zen that he brought to punk rock. He asserts that nothing is sacred, and doubt in everything is essential. He believes, though, that everything is sacred, even while maintaining that everything is profane. He admits his attitudes can all get rather confusing. Certain things, however, are clear: Buddhism stresses the here and now, and the paradise you seek all your life is right in front of you. Profane and sometimes irrelevant; capable of devastating, corrosive humor; offering nothing gentle or conventionally reassuring, Warner pulls no punches. His book is an honest account of his search for truth. June Sawyers
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Adult/High School--Warner has appropriated the phrase "Question authority," a longtime battle cry for the punk-rock aesthetic, for use as a Buddhist mantra. Much of his book is laid out like a memoir. Readers follow the author from high school and his interest in '70s rock music and philosophical thought through his musical career under names like Zero Defex and Dimentia 13 and finally to his dream job with the Japanese television studio that produces the popular live-action children's show, Ultra Man. The common threads throughout are a rabid interest in transcendental meditation and enlightenment. A conversational tone and endless streams of pop references to everything from Minor Threat to TheMatrix movies make this a readable and even fun book. Warner stresses that enlightenment and meditation do not come easy, which separates his writing dramatically from many other Western books on Buddhism. It's nice to see someone with strong ties to rock coming down so hard on people like Terence McKenna or even the Beatles, who promoted drug use as a way toward higher thought. Although some of Warner's connections between Buddhism and the various pieces of pop culture are simplified, his idea of questioning is particularly striking. Not just questioning authority, but friends, oneself, and, yes, him. This wonderfully engaging primer just might get those more dubious, less willing readers to look at the world a bit differently.--Matthew L. Moffett, Northern Virginia Community College, Annandale
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The author presents a series of fascinating stories culled from modern life, using them to illustrate the workings of Zen Buddhism for those who do not care about Zen but could nevertheless benefit from its wisdom. Original.