MYSTICS & ZEN MASTERS

by Thomas Merton ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 5, 1967

The Merton of the 'sixties is not the Merton of Seven Storey Mountain or even of Waters of Siloe. He has become a predictable quantity of unpredictable quality, thanks to his practice periodically of gathering together scraps and pieces of miscellanea and mailing them to his indulgent publisher. Mystics & Zen Masters follows that pattern, being a heterogenous bouillabaisse, sans seasoning, of sixteen such pieces unified solely by virtue of being contained in the same pot. The book comprises three essays more or less on Buddhism, followed by ten which have little to do either with mystics or Zen masters (e.g., a short history of the Jesuits in China which is, even though we are not told that, a review of Dunne's Generation of Giants; and a series of observations on the patristic view of virginity vis-a-vis humanism); the final section contains three more articles on oriental religious thought. On the whole, the quality is typically Mertonian--i.e., good, once the reader overcomes his pique at being conned into buying someone else's scrapbook. On the heels of Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (also a potpourri), and because of the misleading title, the present work will probably enjoy a moderate success; but the reader, like the Zen master, should not be unprepared for disillusionment.

Pub Date: May 5, 1967

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Farrar, Straus & Giroux

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1967

Categories: NONFICTION