All you punk bookworms and hardcore nerds out there have probably already heard of Hardcore Zen, the infamous book written by an ex-punk who is now a renowned Buddhist teacher. The book has been quite welcomed in the hardcore/punk community, as it is offers its insights through a proper punk style and it is not some boring outdated treatise on Zen Buddhism by some obscure dude. The good news for our Greek, spiritually dumb society, is that this awesome book has been translated in Greek and is out right now available at bookshops about town.
Like we said above, the good thing is that the author Brad Warner himself as a personality is a weird mixture of punk and zen. Unlike our familiar in hardcore Krishnacore scene, Warner is the total opposite of hardcore bad boys who went holy and spiritual; if anything, he was an outsider, relatively irrelevant hardcore kid (he played bass for Zero DFX) who turned on Buddhism and there found his true punk ethos. In his writing, he comes out like a snotty punk rock kid that doesn't respect anything, and criticizes everything for what it's really worth. He sees Buddhism through brand-new eyesight which is good in such a saturated book market. Even though this guy dwelves deep into Zen Buddhism, he definitely incorporates a lot of hardcore punk mentality and offers this fresh-minded Buddhist book for everyone to read. I guess this is exactly the reason why his book became so succesful in the first place.
On the other hand, Warner is pretty heavy on the Buddhist side (hence the title 'hardcore' zen is justified: these are some pretty straight on, no BS Zen teachings). Being a certified Zen Buddhist teacher who comes down from a long lineage of Zen masters (not that it means anything in itself, but--well), Warner's got one or two things to say about the Dharma, the study of Buddhism and its practices. So if you're interested into a bit of a different, crazy philosophy, and you're not afraid to bring a bit of a spiritual side into your hardcore life, go for it and read this book!
For our Greek readers: you can find this book with its Greek title, Πανκ Ζεν, out on EnsO Publications and distributed thtough Lector Publications. The translation is very good, and the translator has done a very good job at capturing Warner's style in the greek language. Moreover, he has some knoweledge of hardcore/punk and makes some spot-on comments and footnotes. Visit his blog here (it's worth it): http://www.punkzen.gr/. You can also buy the book online by clicking this link.
Nice post.It seems like the greek translation of the book would be great.Since, some spot-on comments and footnotes were available.Well translated book by heart.That would be lovely.thanks for sharing.
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