Robert M Pirsig, million-selling 'Zen' author, dead at 88

New York: Robert M Pirsig, whose novel "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" became a million- selling classic after more than 100 publishers turned it down, has died.

Pirsig's publishing house, William Morrow, announced that he died Monday at his home in South Benwick, Maine. He was 88 and had been in failing health.

"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" was published in 1974 and was based on a motorcycle trip Pirsig took in the late 1960s with his son, Chris. The book was praised as a unique and masterful blend of narrative and philosophy and was compared by a New Yorker critic to "Moby Dick." Pirsig, a native of Minneapolis, also wrote "Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals."