A Birdie For Buddha

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A Zen Approach To
Playing Golf In
Scotland

About The Authors

The authors are unimportant to this volume, other than as the “Messengers” for the wisdom imparted to them by the two Highland Sheep encountered on the Brora Golf Course in the Scottish Highlands one time when they (the authors) were playing a round there. However, you can tell just by looking at them that these sheep were not ordinary sheep. In fact, these sheep, whose ordinary job is trimming the rough and the fairways, were not always “sheep”. In a previous life they’d been well-known Zen Buddhists - who also happened to be two of the champion links golfers of Scotland. You will note that one of the sheep is a ram, and the other is a ewe. This was not a coincidence. Our Highland Sheep were imparting knowledge for both gentlemen and lady players. And so, dear readers, are we ..(More about the authors...)

Alex B. Pagel

Alex B. Pagel dubbed his first shot at the Maidstone Club course on Long Island in the 1940s under the Scottish eye of the club professional Jack Ross. This legendary man endeavored to teach him how to hit a ball, never a total success, and how to enjoy the game, by contrast a long and continuing success story. Old Jack also frequently implied that the true object of the game was to play in Scotland on a links course in the wind.

Until the 1990s when his daughter matriculated at St. Andrews University in Scotland, the author never had the opportunity to realize the dream the old Scottish professional had planted in his mind because his business (shipping and pig iron) took him mainly to Brazil and the Far East. It was on trips to India, Indonesia, and especially Japan, where he visited and revisited the temples and Zen gardens of Kyoto and Nara that he assimilated a bit of Zen Buddhist style and philosophy. When playing the Scottish links courses, he recognized the startling parallels between the controlled splendors of Zen gardens and the wild nature of the Scottish links. This revelation eventually led to the philosophy embodied in the Zen Approach to Golf which is the subject of Birdie for Buddha.

He is a graduate of Yale University and a lifelong resident of Manhattan. Unlike his co-author, Mr. Pagel had the pleasure of failing out of the University of Virginia (Law School), for which he continues to give thanks. Birdie is his first book.

Alex B. Pagel at Shiskine

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