Editing George Gurdjieff

{{Short description|Russian Empire mystic and writer (c. 1866–1877 – 1949)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2024}}
{{Infobox philosopher
<!--| era = | region = -->
| image           = Georges Gurdjieff.JPG
| caption         = Gurdjieff between 1925 and 1935
| birth_name      = George Ivanovich Gurdjieff
| birth_date      = {{circa|1866–1877}}
| birth_place     = [[Alexandropol]], [[Yerevan Governorate]], [[Russian Empire]]
| death_date      = {{death date|1949|10|29|df=y}}
| death_place     = [[Neuilly-sur-Seine]], [[French Fourth Republic|France]]
| school_tradition= [[Fourth Way]]
| main_interests  = {{cslist| [[Perennial philosophy]] |[[Psychology]] |[[Spirituality]]}}
| notable_students = {{plainlist}}
* [[P. D. Ouspensky]]
* [[Thomas de Hartmann]]
* [[Olga de Hartmann]]
* [[Jane Heap]]
* [[John G. Bennett]]
* [[Maurice Nicoll]]
* [[Olgivanna Lloyd Wright]]
{{endplainlist}}
| notable_ideas   = {{cslist| [[Fourth Way]]| [[Fourth Way enneagram|enneagram]]| [[Centers (Fourth Way)|centers]]}}
| citizenship = {{plainlist|
*[[Russian Empire]] ({{circa|1867}} – May 1918)
*[[First Republic of Armenia]] (May 1918 – December 1920)
*[[Statelessness|Stateless]] (1921–1949)
}}
}}

'''George Ivanovich Gurdjieff''' ({{circa|1866–1877}} – 29 October 1949) was a [[philosopher]], [[Mysticism|mystic]], [[spiritual teacher]], [[composer]], and [[Gurdjieff movements|movements teacher]].{{efn|{{harvnb|Pittman|2008}}: During the early period after Gurdjieff's arrival in Europe in 1921 he gained significant notoriety in Europe and the United States... In October 1922, Gurdjieff set up a school at the Prieuré des Basses Loges at Fontainebleau-Avon, outside of Paris. It was at the Prieuré that Gurdjieff met many notable figures, authors, and artists of the early twentieth century, many of whom went on to be close students and exponents of his teaching. Over the course of his life, those who visited and worked with him included the French author René Daumal; the renowned short story author from New Zealand, [[Katherine Mansfield]]; [[Kathryn Hulme]], later the author of ''[[The Nun's Story|A Nun's Life]]''; [[P. L. Travers]], the author of ''[[Mary Poppins (book series)|Mary Poppins]]''; and [[Jean Toomer]], the author of ''[[Cane (novel)|Cane]]'', whose work and influence would figure prominently in the [[Harlem Renaissance]]... Numerous study groups, organizations, formal foundations, and even land-based communities have been initiated in his name, primarily in North and South America and Europe, and to a lesser extent, in Japan, China, India, Australia, and South Africa. In 1979, Peter Brook, the British theater director and author, created a film based on ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men (film)|Meetings with Remarkable Men]]''.}} Born in the [[Russian Empire]], he briefly became a citizen of the [[First Republic of Armenia]] after its formation in 1918, but fled the impending [[Red Army invasion of Armenia]] in 1920, which rendered him [[Statelessness|stateless]]. In the early 1920s, he applied for British citizenship, but his application was denied. He then settled in France, where he lived and taught for the rest of his life.

Gurdjieff taught that people are not conscious of themselves and thus live their lives in a state of hypnotic "waking sleep", but that it is possible to awaken to a higher state of consciousness and serve our purpose as human beings. His student [[P. D. Ouspensky]] referred to Gurdjieff's teachings as the "[[Fourth Way]]".<ref>{{cite book |last=Ouspensky |first=P. D. |author-link=P. D. Ouspensky |title=In Search of the Miraculous |url=https://archive.org/details/insearchofmiracu00uspe/page/312 |year=1977 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/insearchofmiracu00uspe/page/312 312–313] |publisher=Harcourt, Brace |quote=Schools of the fourth way exist for the needs of the work... But no matter what the fundamental aim of the work is ... When the work is done the schools close. |isbn=0-15-644508-5}}</ref>

Gurdjieff's teaching has inspired the formation of many groups around the world. After his death in 1949, the [[Gurdjieff Foundation]] in Paris was established and led by his close pupil [[Jeanne de Salzmann]] in cooperation with other direct pupils of Gurdjieff, until her death in 1990; and then by her son [[Michel de Salzmann]], until his death in 2001.

The International Association of the Gurdjieff Foundations comprises the Institut Gurdjieff in France; The Gurdjieff Foundation in the USA; The Gurdjieff Society in the UK; and the Gurdjieff Foundation in Venezuela.<ref>{{Cite web |title=International Association of the Gurdjieff Foundations |url=http://www.gurdjieff-foundation.org/Home/ |access-date=2025-03-15 |website=Gurdjieff-foundation.org}}</ref>

== Early life ==
Gurdjieff was born in Alexandropol, [[Yerevan Governorate]], [[Russian Empire]] (now [[Gyumri]], [[Armenia]]). His father Ivan Ivanovich Gurdjieff was [[Greeks|Greek]], and a renowned [[Ashik|ashugh]] under the pseudonym of ''Adash'', who in the 1870s managed large herds of cattle and sheep.<ref>{{harvnb|Gurdjieff|1963|pp=32, 40}}</ref> The long-held view is that Gurdjieff's mother was [[Armenians|Armenian]], although some scholars have recently speculated that she too was Greek.<ref>{{harvnb|Pittman|2012|p=223}}: "Though the long-held view is that Gurdjieff's mother was Armenian, Paul Taylor, on the basis of recent research, offers that Gurdjieff's mother's father was Greek (Taylor 2008)."</ref>{{efn|Opinions about Gurdjieff's mother's ethnicity include:
* {{harvnb|Taylor|2020|p=14}}: "If it seems odd that an Armenian woman would carry a Greek name, it is apparent that that Gurdjieff's mother was Greek as well as his father, confirming Gurdjieff's frequent assertion that his mother tongue was Greek. Gurdjieff's German papers, which he carried during the Second World War, identified him as Greek."
* {{harvnb|Churton|2017|pp=19–25}}: "Archival Records:{{nbsp}}... One thing we can be reasonably certain of is that both Gurdjieff's parents were Greek.{{nbsp}}... It is quite possible that Ivan met the Greek Evdokia in Alexandropol's substantial Greek quarter, known as Urmonts,{{nbsp}}..."
* {{harvnb|Lipsey|2019|pp=11, 316}}: "In his major book, ''Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson'' (which developed across multiple languages from the mid-1920s through to its English-language publication in 1950), Gurdjieff was ferociously satirical where ancient Greek culture was concerned—though he was born to Greek parents and spoke Greek from his earliest days (as well as Armenian, and soon Russian and Turkish).<sup>15</sup>{{nbsp}}... 15. It will come as a surprise to readers familiar with the Gurdjieff legacy that both of his parents were Greek; the assumption has long been that his mother Evdokia was Armenian."
* {{harvnb|Bennet|1984|p=30}}: "The first thing to remember about Gurdjieff is that he was born of a Greek father and an Armenian mother."
* {{harvnb|de Hartmann|de Hartmann|1964|p=xv}} "Georgi Ivanovich Gurdjieff was born of a Greek father and an Armenian mother."
* {{harvnb|Moore|1999|p=84}}: "...{{nbsp}}but on the human level he cared passionately that his Armenian mother and sisters in Alexandropol remain safely on the Russian side."
* {{harvnb|Needleman|Baker|1997|p=431}}: "He was born, probably in 1866, of a Greek father and an Armenian mother in Alexandropol (Leninakan), Armenia, a region where Eastern and Western cultures mixed and often clashed."
* {{harvnb|Webb|1987|P=26}}: "Gurdjieff was the son of a Greek father and an Armenian mother. Although he spoke both Greek and Armenian, the latter was the language of the Gurdjieff household."
* {{harvnb|Lang|1988|p=166}}: "Unquestionably, Gurdjieff is among the most intriguing men Armenia has ever produced. Yet the Armenians have been slow to claim him as one of their own, and his name appears in few reference books connected with Armenia."
* {{harvnb|Pittman|2008|p=x}}: "Gurdjieff was born in Gyumri, Armenia, to an Armenian mother and a Cappadocian-Greek father."
* {{harvnb|Tchekhovitch|2006|pp=244–240}}: "Since for some time I had the privilege of living close to Mr. Gurdjieff's mother, I am sure the reader will understand why I would wish to devote to this woman some recollections that illustrate her exceptional character{{nbsp}}... Her last words, spoken in Armenian, had the character of a Japanese poem."}} According to Gurdjieff himself, his father came of a [[Byzantine Greeks|Greek family whose ancestors had emigrated from Byzantium]] after the [[Fall of Constantinople]] in 1453, with his family initially moving to [[central Anatolia]], and from there eventually to [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]] in the [[Caucasus]].{{efn|{{harvnb|Churton|2017|pp=19–25}}: "Archival Records: Hearst columnist and old friend of Aleister Crowley William Seabrook, in reporting Gurdjieff's arrival in New York in 1924, gave the family name as Georgiades, a familiar name to Greek immigrants in the United States. Whence Seabrook got what he took to be the original Greek form of the Anglicized Russian Gurdjieff is unknown. ''Georgos'' means "farmer" in Greek and is the origin of Gurdjieff's Christian name, Georgii. ''Georgeades'' means "son of George" but as far as we know, Gurdjieff's father's name was Ivan Ivanovich (or son of Ivan).{{nbsp}}... There was, however, a village called Gurdji, part of Armutlu on the Turkish Armutlu peninsula by the Sea of Marmara just south of Constantinople (Istanbul), no longer listed, the scene of Greek army atrocities against Turks during the 1920–1921 Greco-Turkish war waged in western Turkey. Gurdjieff maintained in ''Meetings'' his family had been Byzantines before the Turks conquered Constantinople (capital of the Byzantine Empire) in 1453, migrating to central Anatolia due to Turkish persecution around Constantinople. The Marmara peninsula had certainly been part of what was left of Byzantium before the capital's overthrow in 1453."}}{{efn|{{harvnb|Shirley|2004}}: "''Gurdjieff'' is a Russian variant of the Greek ''G[e]orgiades'', his actual surname at birth. His full Russian name was Georgei Ivanovich Gurdjieff.{{nbsp}}... Gurdjieff was born in the small Russian-Armenian city of Alexandropol, son of a well-to-do owner of extensive herds of cattle and sheep, Ioann[i]s G[e]orgiades, a Greek."}}{{efn|{{harvnb|Lang|1988|p=166}}: "According to Gurdjieff himself, his father came of a Greek family whose ancestors had emigrated from Byzantium after the conquest of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in 1453. At first, the family moved to central Anatolia, and from there eventually to Georgia in the Caucasus. The name Gurdjieff gives some colour to this account, since 'Gurji' in Persian means 'a Georgian', and the Russian-style surname Gurdjieff would mean 'the man from Georgia'. However, the late John G. Bennett, who knew Gurdjieff intimately for many years, believes that Gurdjieff's father was called John Georgiades."}}

There are conflicting views regarding Gurdjieff's birth date, ranging from 1866 to 1877. The bulk of extant records weigh heavily toward 1877, but Gurdjieff in reported conversations with students gave the year of his birth as {{circa|1867}},<ref name="Churton2017-2">{{harvnb|Churton|2017|pp=3–4, 316–317}}</ref> which is corroborated by the account of his niece Luba Gurdjieff Everitt.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Everitt |first=Luba Gurdjieff |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=J08PAAAACAAJ |title=Luba Gurdjieff: A Memoir with Recipes |publisher=SLG Books |isbn=978-0-943389-22-6 |publication-date=1997 |page=12 |language=en |orig-date=1993}}</ref> George Kiourtzidis, great-grandson of Gurdjieff's paternal uncle Vasilii (through Vasilii's son Alexander), recalled that his grandfather Alexander, born in 1875, said that Gurdjieff was about three years older than him, which would point to a birth date {{circa|1872}}.<ref name="Churton2017-2" /> A number of scholars have also tried to deduce Gurdjieff's year of birth by analyzing an incident of a [[cattle plague]] he wrote about in his book ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men]]'', where Gurdjieff claimed he was about seven years old at the time of the calamity; its occurrence has been dated by James Moore to 1873, by Mohammad H. Tamdgidi to 1879, by Paul Beekman Taylor to either 1877 or 1884, and by Tobias Churton to {{circa|1883–1884}}.<ref name="Tamdgidi2009">{{harvnb|Tamdgidi|2009|pp=127–128}}</ref><ref name="Churton2017">{{harvnb|Churton|2017|pp=25–27}}</ref> According to Tamdgidi, the confusion surrounding Gurdjieff's year of birth:<ref name="Tamdgidi2009" />
{{Blockquote
|text=was an example of a whole series of puzzles, signposts, and difficulties Gurdjieff deliberately created for his pupils, readers, and posterity, for specific reasons that are inseparable from the method and aims of his teaching. As Gurdjieff later discovered about the nature and purpose of "ancient art," "lawful inexactitudes" consciously and intentionally placed in artwork (and in this case, in his own writings) play significant roles in the transmission of important information to future generations.
}}
Although official documents consistently record the day of his birth as 28 December, Gurdjieff himself celebrated his birthday either on the [[Old Calendarists|Old Orthodox]] [[Julian calendar]] date of 1 January, or according to the [[Gregorian calendar]] date for New Year of 13 January (up to 1899; 14 January after 1900).<ref name="Churton2017-2" /> The year of 1872 is inscribed in a plate on the grave-marker in the cemetery of [[Avon, Seine-et-Marne]], France, where his body was buried.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.landrucimetieres.fr/spip/spip.php?article1949|title=AVON (77) : cimetière – Cimetières de France et d'ailleurs|website=www.landrucimetieres.fr}}</ref>

Gurdjieff spent his childhood in [[Kars]], which, from 1878 to 1918, was the administrative capital of the Russian-ruled Transcaucasus province of [[Kars Oblast]], a border region [[Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878)|recently acquired following the defeat of the Ottoman Empire]]. It contained extensive grassy plateau-steppe and high mountains, and was inhabited by a [[Multinational state|multi-ethnic]] and [[Religious pluralism|multi-confessional]] population that had a history of respect for travelling mystics and holy men, and for religious [[syncretism]] and [[Religious conversion|conversion]]. Both the city of Kars and the surrounding territory were home to an extremely diverse population: although part of the [[Armenian Highlands|Armenian Plateau]], the Russian-ruled Transcaucasus province of Kars Oblast was home to [[Armenians]], [[Caucasus Greeks]], [[Pontic Greeks]], [[Georgians]], [[Russians]], [[Kurds]], [[Turkish people|Turks]], and smaller numbers of Christian communities from eastern and central Europe such as [[Caucasus Germans]], [[Estonians]], and Russian Orthodox sectarian communities like the [[Molokans]], [[Doukhobors]], [[Prygun]]y, and [[Subbotniks]].<ref name="John G. Bennett p. 55">{{cite book |last1=Bennett |first1=John G. |title=Witness : the autobiography of John G. Bennett |date=1974 |publisher=Omen Press |location=Tucson, Arizona |isbn=9780912358482 |page=55 |url=https://search.worldcat.org/title/2016558 |access-date=27 August 2024}}</ref>

Gurdjieff makes particular mention of the [[Yazidis|Yazidi community]]. Growing up in a multi-ethnic society, Gurdjieff became fluent in [[Armenian language|Armenian]], [[Pontic Greek]], [[Russian language|Russian]], and [[Turkish language|Turkish]], speaking the last in a mixture of elegant [[Ottoman Turkish language|Ottoman Turkish]] with some dialect.<ref name="John G. Bennett p. 55"/> He later acquired "a working facility with several European languages".<ref>{{cite book |last=Challenger |first=Anna T. |title=Philosophy and Art in Gurdjieff's Beelzebub: A Modern Sufi Odyssey |publisher=Rodopi |location=Amsterdam |year=2002 |page=1 |isbn=9789042014893}}</ref>

Early influences on him included his father, a carpenter and amateur ''[[ashik]]'' or [[bard]]ic poet,<ref>''Meetings with Remarkable Men'', Chapter II. Gurdjieff uses the spelling "ashok".</ref> and the priest of the [[Cathedral of Kars|town's cathedral]], Dean Borsh, a family friend. The young Gurdjieff avidly read literature from many sources and influenced by these writings and witnessing a number of phenomena that he could not explain, he formed the conviction that there existed a hidden truth known to mankind in the past, which could not be ascertained from science or mainstream religion.

===Travels===
In early adulthood, according to his own account, Gurdjieff's search for such knowledge led him to travel widely to [[Central Asia]], Egypt, Iran, India, Tibet and other places before he returned to Russia for a few years in 1912. He was never forthcoming about the source of his teaching, which he once labelled as [[esoteric Christianity]], in that it ascribes a psychological rather than a literal meaning to various parables and statements found in the Bible.<ref>p.109 from "In Search of the Miraculous": for the benefit of those who know already, I will say that, if you like, this is esoteric Christianity.</ref> The only account of his wanderings appears in his book ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men]]'', which is not generally considered to be a reliable autobiography. One example is of the adventure of walking across the Gobi desert on stilts, where Gurdjieff said he was able to look down on the contours of the sand dunes while the sand storm whirled around below him.<ref>S. Wellbeloved, ''Gurdjieff, Astrology and Beelzebub's Tales'', pp. 9–13</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gurdjieff.org/owens2.htm |title=T. W. Owens, Commentary on Meetings with Remarkable Men |publisher=Gurdjieff.org |date=2000-04-01 |access-date=2014-03-02}}</ref> Each chapter is named after a "remarkable man", some of whom were putative members of a society called "The Seekers of Truth".

After Gurdjieff's death, [[J. G. Bennett]] researched his potential sources and suggested that the men were symbolic of the three types of people to whom Gurdjieff referred: No. 1 centred in their physical body; No. 2 centred in their emotions and No. 3 centred in their mind. Gurdjieff describes how he encountered [[dervish]]es, [[fakir]]s and descendants of the [[Essenes]], whose teaching he said had been conserved at a monastery in Sarmoung. The book also has an overarching [[quest]] involving a map of "pre-sand Egypt" and culminates in an encounter with the "[[Sarmoung Brotherhood]]".<ref name="sedgwick">Mark Sedgwick, "[https://books.google.com/books?id=7cjFFgvUdDUC&pg=PA208 European Neo-Sufi Movements in the Inter-war Period]" in ''Islam in Inter-War Europe'', ed. by Natalie Clayer and Eric Germain. Columbia Univ. Press, 2008 p. 208. {{ISBN|978-0-231-70100-6}}</ref>

Gurdjieff wrote that he supported himself during his travels by engaging in various enterprises such as running a travelling repair shop and making paper flowers; and on one occasion while thinking about what he could do, he described catching sparrows in the park and then dyeing them yellow to be sold as canaries;<ref>Gurdjieff, G.I: "The Material Question", published as an addendum to ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men]]''</ref>  It is also speculated by commentators that during his travels he was engaged in a certain amount of political activity, as part of [[The Great Game]].<ref>Moore, pp 36–7</ref>

==Career==
From 1913 to 1949, the chronology appears to be based on material that can be confirmed by primary documents, independent witnesses, cross-references and reasonable inference.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.gurdjieff.org.uk/gs9.htm |title=James Moore, Chronology of Gurdjieff's Life |publisher=Gurdjieff.org.uk |access-date=2014-03-02 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150219040514/http://www.gurdjieff.org.uk/gs9.htm |archive-date=2015-02-19 }}</ref> On New Year's Day in 1912, Gurdjieff arrived in [[Moscow]] and attracted his first students, including his cousin, the sculptor [[Sergey Merkurov]], and the eccentric Rachmilievitch. In the same year, he married the Polish Julia Ostrowska in Saint Petersburg. In 1914, Gurdjieff advertised his ballet, ''The Struggle of the Magicians,'' and he supervised his pupils' writing of the sketch ''Glimpses of Truth.''{{cn|date=March 2025}}

===Gurdjieff and Ouspensky===
In 1915, Gurdjieff accepted [[P. D. Ouspensky]] as a pupil, and in 1916, he accepted the composer [[Thomas de Hartmann]] and his wife, Olga, as students. He then had about 30 pupils. Ouspensky already had a reputation as a writer on mystical subjects and had conducted his own, ultimately disappointing, search for wisdom in the East. The Fourth Way "system" taught during this period was complex and metaphysical, partly expressed in scientific terminology.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

During the revolutionary upheaval in Russia, Gurdjieff left [[Petrograd]] in 1917 to return to his family home in Alexandropol (present-day [[Gyumri]] in Armenia). During the [[October Revolution]], he set up a temporary study community in [[Essentuki]] in the Caucasus, where he worked intensively with a small group of Russian pupils. Gurdjieff's eldest sister Anna and her family later arrived there as refugees, informing him that Turks had shot his father in [[Alexandropol]] on 15 May. As the area became increasingly threatened by civil war, Gurdjieff fabricated a newspaper story announcing his forthcoming "scientific expedition" to "Mount Induc". Posing as a scientist and wearing a red fireman's belt with brass rings<ref>Olga de Hartmann: Our Life with Mr Gurdjieff p. 112</ref> Gurdjieff left Essentuki with fourteen companions (excluding Gurdjieff's family and Ouspensky). They travelled by train to Maikop, where hostilities delayed them for three weeks. In the spring of 1919, Gurdjieff met the artist Alexandre de Salzmann and his wife Jeanne and accepted them as pupils. Assisted by Jeanne de Salzmann, Gurdjieff gave the first public demonstration of his [[Gurdjieff movements|Sacred Dances]] (Movements at the [[Tbilisi]] Opera House, 22 June).{{cn|date=March 2025}}

In March 1918, Ouspensky separated from Gurdjieff, settling in England and teaching the Fourth Way in his own right. The two men were to have a very ambivalent relationship for decades to come.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

===Georgia and Turkey===
In 1919, Gurdjieff and his closest pupils moved to [[Tbilisi]], [[Democratic Republic of Georgia|Georgia]], where Gurdjieff's wife Julia Ostrowska, the Stjoernvals, the Hartmanns, and the de Salzmanns continued to assimilate his teaching. Gurdjieff concentrated on his still unstaged ballet, ''The Struggle of the Magicians''. [[Thomas de Hartmann]] (who had made his debut years ago, before [[Emperor of Russia|Tsar]] [[Nicholas II of Russia]]), worked on the music for the ballet, and [[Olgivanna Lloyd Wright|Olga Ivanovna Hinzenberg]] (who years later wed the American architect [[Frank Lloyd Wright]]), practiced the dances. It was here that Gurdjieff opened his first [[Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man]].{{cn|date=March 2025}}

In late May 1920, when political and social conditions in Georgia deteriorated, his party travelled to [[Batumi]] on the [[Black Sea]] coast and then by ship to [[Constantinople]] (today [[Istanbul]]).<ref>[[Thomas de Hartmann]], ''Our Life With Mr. Gurdjieff'' (1962), Penguin 1974 pp.94–5.</ref> Gurdjieff rented an apartment on Kumbaracı Street in [[Pera (Beyoğlu)|Péra]] and later at 13 Abdullatif Yemeneci Sokak near the [[Galata Tower]].<ref>[http://www.gurdjieff-movements.net/newsletter/2003-03/06_gurdjieff_istanbul.htm "In Gurdjieff's wake in Istanbul"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061031072357/http://www.gurdjieff-movements.net/newsletter/2003-03/06_gurdjieff_istanbul.htm |date=2006-10-31 }}, Gurdjieff Movements, March 2003.</ref> The apartment is near the [[Khanqah]] (Sufi lodge) of the [[Mevlevi Order]] (a [[Tariqa|Sufi order]] following the teachings of [[Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi]]), where Gurdjieff, Ouspensky and [[Thomas de Hartmann]] witnessed the ''[[Sema|Sama]]'' ceremony of [[the Whirling Dervishes]]. In Istanbul, Gurdjieff also met his future pupil, Capt. [[John G. Bennett]], then head of the [[Directorate of Military Intelligence (United Kingdom)|British Directorate of Military Intelligence]] in [[Ottoman Turkey]], who described his impression of Gurdjieff as follows:

<blockquote>
It was there that I first met Gurdjieff in the autumn of 1920, and no surroundings could have been more appropriate. In Gurdjieff, East and West do not just meet. Their difference is annihilated in a world outlook which knows no distinctions of race or creed. This was my first, and has remained one of my strongest impressions. [[Caucasus Greeks|A Greek from the Caucasus]], he spoke Turkish with an accent of unexpected purity, the accent that one associates with those born and bred in the narrow circle of the [[Ottoman court|Imperial Court]]. His appearance was striking enough even in [[Ottoman Turkey|Turkey]], where one saw many unusual types. His head was shaven, immense black moustache, eyes which at one moment seemed very pale and at another almost black. Below average height, he gave nevertheless an impression of great physical strength.{{cite quote|date=March 2025}}
</blockquote>

===''Prieuré'' at Avon===
In August 1921 and 1922, Gurdjieff travelled around western Europe, lecturing and giving demonstrations of his work in various cities, such as Berlin and London. He attracted the allegiance of Ouspensky's many prominent pupils (notably the editor [[A. R. Orage]]). After an unsuccessful attempt to gain British citizenship, Gurdjieff established the [[Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man]] south of Paris at the ''Prieuré des Basses Loges'' in [[Avon, Seine-et-Marne|Avon]] near the famous ''[[Chateau Fontainebleau|Château de Fontainebleau]].'' The once-impressive but somewhat crumbling mansion set in extensive grounds housed an entourage of several dozen, including some of Gurdjieff's remaining relatives and some [[White émigré|White Russian]] refugees. Gurdjieff is quoted by his students in ''Views from the Real World'' as saying: "The Institute can help one to be able to be a Christian." An aphorism was displayed which stated: "Here there are neither Russians nor English, Jews nor Christians, but only those who pursue one aim{{snd}}to be able to be."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Recollections |first=Pupils |title=Views From The Real World |pages=152, 286 |url=http://www.gurdjieff.am/library/views.pdf |year=1973 |publisher=Routledge and Keegan Paul |isbn=0525228705 |language=en}}</ref>

New pupils included [[C. S. Nott]], {{ill|René Zuber|fr|vertical-align=sup}}, [[Margaret C. Anderson|Margaret Anderson]] and her ward [[Fritz Peters (author)|Fritz Peters]]. The intellectual and middle-class types who were attracted to Gurdjieff's teaching often found the Prieuré's spartan accommodation and emphasis on hard labour on the grounds disconcerting. Gurdjieff was putting into practice his teaching that people need to develop physically, emotionally and intellectually, so lectures, music, dance, and manual work were organised. Older pupils noticed how the Prieuré teaching differed from the complex metaphysical "system" that had been taught in Russia.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gurdjieff.org/lipsey1.htm |title=R. Lipsey: ''Gurdjieff Observed'' |publisher=Gurdjieff.org |date=1999-10-01 |access-date=2014-03-02}}</ref> In addition to the physical hardships, his personal behaviour towards pupils could be ferocious:

<blockquote>
Gurdjieff was standing by his bed in a state of what seemed to me to be completely uncontrolled fury. He was raging at Orage, who stood impassively and very pale, framed in one of the windows... Suddenly, in the space of an instant, Gurdjieff's voice stopped, his whole personality changed and he gave me a broad smile—and looking incredibly peaceful and inwardly quiet, motioned me to leave. He then resumed his tirade with undiminished force. This happened so quickly that I do not believe that Mr. Orage even noticed the break in the rhythm.<ref>Fritz Peters, ''Boyhood with Gurdjieff''.</ref>
</blockquote>

During this period, Gurdjieff acquired notoriety as "the man who killed Katherine Mansfield" after [[Katherine Mansfield]] died there of [[tuberculosis]] on 9 January 1923.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Moore |first=James |title=Gurdjieff and Mansfield |page=[https://archive.org/details/gurdjieffmansfie0000moor/page/3 3] |quote=In numerous accounts Gurdjieff is defined with stark simplicity as "the man who killed Katherine Mansfield". |year=1980 |publisher=Routledge & Kegan Paul |isbn=0-7100-0488-5 |url=https://archive.org/details/gurdjieffmansfie0000moor/page/3 }}</ref> However, James Moore and Ouspensky<ref>Ouspensky, ''In search of the Miraculous,'' chapter XVIII, p. 392</ref> argue that Mansfield knew she would soon die and that Gurdjieff made her last days happy and fulfilling.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Fraser |first=Ross |title=Gabrielle Hope 1916–1962 |journal=Art New Zealand |volume=30 |issue=Winter |url=http://www.art-newzealand.com/Issues21to30/hope.htm |access-date=2011-05-10 |archive-date=2017-10-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171022213005/http://www.art-newzealand.com/Issues21to30/hope.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref>

===First car accident, writing and visits to North America===
{{anchor|First car accident, writing and visits to America}}
Starting in 1924, Gurdjieff made visits to North America, where he eventually received the pupils taught previously by A. R. Orage. In 1924, while driving alone from Paris to [[Fontainebleau]], he had a near-fatal car accident. Nursed by his wife and mother, he made a slow and painful recovery against all medical expectations. Still convalescent, he formally "disbanded" his institute on 26 August (in fact he dispersed only his "less dedicated" pupils) which he expressed was a personal undertaking: "in the future, under the pretext of different worthy reasons, to remove from my eyesight all those who by this or that make my life too comfortable".<ref>Life is Only Real then, when 'I Am'</ref>{{incomplete citation|date=March 2025}}

While recovering from his injuries and still too weak to write himself, he began to dictate his magnum opus, ''Beelzebub's Tales'', the first part of ''All and Everything'', in a mixture of Armenian and Russian. The book is generally found to be convoluted and obscure and forces the reader to "work" to find its meaning. He continued to develop the book over some years, writing in noisy cafes which he found conducive for setting down his thoughts.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Gurdjieff's mother died in 1925 and his wife developed cancer and died in June 1926. Ouspensky attended her funeral. According to the writer Fritz Peters, Gurdjieff was in New York from November 1925 to the spring of 1926, when he succeeded in raising over $100,000.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Taylor |first=Paul Beekman |title=Gurdjieff's America |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=50w1tPTV0EEC&pg=PA103 |page=103 |year=2004 |isbn=978-1-904998-00-6 |quote=What Gurdjieff was doing during the winter of 1925–1926...|publisher=Lighthouse Editions Ltd }}</ref> He was to make six or seven trips to the US, but alienated a number of people with his brash and impudent demands for money.

A Chicago-based Gurdjieff group was founded by [[Jean Toomer]] in 1927 after he had trained at the Prieuré for a year. [[Diana Huebert]] was a regular member of the Chicago group, and documented the several visits Gurdjieff made to the group in 1932 and 1934 in her memoirs on the man.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|url=https://www.scribd.com/doc/253516461/Diana-Faidy-Reminiscences-of-My-Work-With-Gurdjieff|title=Diana Faidy – Reminiscences of My Work with Gurdjieff|last=Faidy|first=Diana|access-date=12 February 2019}}</ref>

Despite his fund-raising efforts in America, the Prieuré operation ran into debt and was shut down in 1932. Gurdjieff constituted a new teaching group in Paris. Known as The Rope, it was composed of only women, many of them writers, and several lesbians. Members included [[Kathryn Hulme]], [[Jane Heap]], Margaret Anderson and [[Enrico Caruso]]'s widow, Dorothy. Gurdjieff became acquainted with [[Gertrude Stein]] through its members, but she was never a follower.<ref>{{Cite web
| first= Rob | last= Baker | year= 2000
|title=No Harem: Gurdjieff and the Women of The Rope|url=https://www.gurdjieff.org/rope.htm|access-date=2023-03-20|website=www.gurdjieff.org}}</ref>

In 1935, Gurdjieff stopped work on ''All and Everything.'' He had completed the first two parts of the planned trilogy but then started on the ''Third Series.'' (It was later published under the title ''Life Is Real Only Then, When 'I Am'.'') In 1936, he settled in a flat at 6, {{ill|Rue des Colonels-Renard|fr|vertical-align=sup}} in Paris, where he was to stay for the rest of his life. In 1937, his brother Dmitry died, and The Rope disbanded.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

==World War II==
Although the flat at 6 Rue des Colonels-Renard was very small, he continued to teach groups of pupils there throughout the war. Visitors have described his pantry or 'inner sanctum' as being stocked with an extraordinary collection of eastern delicacies and the suppers he held with elaborate toasts with vodka and cognac to "idiots".<ref>{{cite book|title=J. G. and E. Bennett ''Idiots in Paris'' |id={{ASIN|0877287244|country=uk}} }}</ref> Having cut a physically impressive figure for many years, he was now paunchy. His teaching was now conveyed more directly through personal interaction with his pupils, who were encouraged to study the ideas he had expressed in ''Beelzebub's Tales''.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

His personal business enterprises (including intermittently dealing in oriental rugs and carpets for much of his life, among other activities) enabled him to offer charitable relief to neighbours who had been affected by the difficult circumstances of the war, and it also brought him to the attention of the authorities, leading to a night in the cells.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

==Final years==
[[File:Georges Gurdjieff dead.JPG|thumb|right|The body of Gurdjieff, lying in state, France. "Every one of those unfortunates during the process of existence should constantly sense and be cognizant of the inevitability of his own death as well as of the death of everyone upon whom his eyes or attention rests".]]

After the war, Gurdjieff tried to reconnect with his former pupils. Ouspensky was hesitant, but after his death (October 1947), his widow advised his remaining pupils to see Gurdjieff in Paris. J. G. Bennett also visited from England, their first meeting in 25 years. Ouspensky's pupils in England had all thought that Gurdjieff was dead. They discovered he was alive only after the death of Ouspensky, who had not told them that Gurdjieff, from whom he had learnt of the teaching, was still living. They were overjoyed and many of Ouspensky's pupils including Rina Hands, Basil Tilley and Catherine Murphy visited Gurdjieff in Paris. Hands and Murphy worked on the typing and retyping for the publication of ''All and Everything''.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Gurdjieff suffered a second car accident in 1948 but again made an unexpected recovery.

<blockquote>"I was looking at a dying man. Even this is not enough to express it. It was a dead man, a corpse, that came out of the car; and yet it walked. I was shivering like someone who sees a ghost."

With iron-like tenacity, he managed to get to his room, where he sat down and said: "Now all organs are destroyed. Must make new". Then, he turned to Bennett, smiling: "Tonight you come dinner. I must make body work". As he spoke, a great spasm of pain shook his body and blood gushed from an ear. Bennett thought: "He has a cerebral haemorrhage. He will kill himself if he continues to force his body to move". But then he reflected: "He has to do all this. If he allows his body to stop moving, he will die. He has power over his body".<ref>Perry, Whitall: ''Gurdjieff in the Light of tradition'', quoting J. G. Bennett.</ref></blockquote>

After recovering, Gurdjieff finalised plans for the official publication of ''Beelzebub's Tales'' and made two trips to New York. He also visited the famous prehistoric cave paintings at [[Lascaux]], giving his interpretation of their significance to his pupils.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

==Death==
Gurdjieff died of cancer at the American Hospital in [[Neuilly-sur-Seine]], France, on 29 October 1949.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://gurdjiefflegacy.org/70links/final_years.htm|title=The Teaching For Our Time|website=gurdjiefflegacy.org|publisher=The Gurdjieff Legacy Foundation|access-date=May 26, 2022}}</ref> His funeral took place at the [[Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, Paris|St. Alexandre Nevsky Russian Orthodox Cathedral]] at 12 Rue Daru, Paris. He is buried in the cemetery at Avon (near Fontainebleau).<ref>[[James Moore (Cornish author)|James Moore]] (1993). ''Gurdjieff&nbsp;– A Biography: The Anatomy of a Myth''.</ref>

==Personal life==
===Children===
Although no evidence or documents have certified anyone as a child of Gurdjieff, the following six people have been claimed to be his children:<ref name="Paul Beekman Taylor 1998 page 3">Paul Beekman Taylor, ''Shadows of Heaven: Gurdjieff and Toomer'' (Red Wheel, 1998), p. 3.</ref>
* Nikolai Stjernvall (1919–2010), whose mother was Elizaveta Grigorievna, wife of Leonid Robertovich de Stjernvall.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.gurdjieff-internet.com/article_details.php?ID=340&W=63 |title=In Memoriam Nikolai Stjernvall – Taylor, Paul Beekman |publisher=Gurdjieff-internet.com |access-date=2014-03-02 |archive-date=2014-04-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140427013412/http://www.gurdjieff-internet.com/article_details.php?ID=340&W=63 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
* [[Michel de Salzmann]] (1923–2001), whose mother was [[Jeanne de Salzmann|Jeanne Allemand de Salzmann]]; he later became head of the Gurdjieff Foundation.<ref>Paul Beekman Taylor, ''Gurdjieff's America: Mediating the Miraculous'' (Lighthouse Editions, 2005), page 211</ref>
* Cynthie Sophia "Dushka" Howarth (1924–2010); her mother was dancer Jessmin Howarth.<ref>Roger Friedland and Harold Zellman, ''The Fellowship: The Untold Story of Frank Lloyd Wright and the Taliesin Fellowship'' (Harper Collins, 2007), page 424</ref><ref>Jessmin Howarth and Dushka Howarth, ''It's Up to Ourselves: A Mother, a Daughter, and Gurdjieff'' (1998)</ref><ref name="nytimes1">{{cite news |title=Paid Notice – Deaths HOWARTH, DUSHKA – Paid Death Notice |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A06EFDE163AF937A25757C0A9669D8B63 |work=The New York Times |date=2010-04-14 |access-date=2014-03-02}}</ref> She went on to found the Gurdjieff Heritage Society.<ref name="nytimes1"/>
* Eve Taylor (born 1928), whose mother was one of his followers, American socialite Edith Annesley Taylor.<ref name="Paul Beekman Taylor 1998 page 3"/>
* Sergei Chaverdian; his mother was Lily Galumnian Chaverdian.<ref name="Paul Beekman Taylor 1998">Paul Beekman Taylor, ''Shadows of Heaven: Gurdjieff and Toomer'' (Red Wheel, 1998), page xv</ref>
* Andrei, born to a mother known only as Georgii.<ref name="Paul Beekman Taylor 1998"/>

Gurdjieff had a niece, Luba Gurdjieff Everitt, who for about 40 years (1950s–1990s) ran a small but rather famous restaurant, Luba's Bistro, in [[Knightsbridge]], London.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Luba Gurdjieff Archive |url=https://gurdjieff-heritage-society.org/archives-luba-gurdjieff/ |publisher=Gurdjieff Heritage Society |access-date=27 April 2022}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Thorn Tree forum – Luba's |url=https://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/forums/europe-uk-ireland/england/luba-s |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190204122334/https://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/forums/europe-uk-ireland/england/luba-s |archive-date=4 February 2019 |url-status=dead |publisher=Lonely Planet |language=en|access-date=2019-02-04}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Luba Gurdjieff: A Memoir with Recipes |url=http://www.slgbooks.com/books/luba |publisher=Snow Lion Graphics/SLG Books |access-date=27 April 2022}}</ref>

==Ideas==
[[File:Georges Gurdjieff.jpg|thumb|George Gurdjieff]]
Gurdjieff taught that people cannot perceive reality as they are, because they are not conscious of themselves, but rather live in a state of hypnotic "waking sleep" of constantly turning thoughts, worries and imagination. The title of one of his books is ''Life is Real, Only Then, when "I am"''.

"Man lives his life in sleep, and in sleep he dies."<ref>[[P. D. Ouspensky]] (1949), ''[[In Search of the Miraculous]]''</ref>
As a result, a person perceives the world while in a state of dream. He asserted that people in their ordinary waking state function as unconscious [[automaton]]s, but that a person can "wake up" and become what a human being ought to be.<ref>[http://www.bmrc.berkeley.edu/people/misc/School.html Jacob Needleman, ''G. I. Gurdjieff and His School''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030402192646/http://www.bmrc.berkeley.edu/people/misc/School.html |date=2003-04-02 }}</ref>

Some contemporary researchers claim that Gurdjieff's concept of self-remembering is "close to the Buddhist concept of awareness or a popular definition of 'mindfulness'.{{nbsp}}... The Buddhist term translated into English as 'mindfulness' originates in the Pali term 'sati', which is identical to Sanskrit 'smṛti'. Both terms mean 'to remember'."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://cgscholar.com/bookstore/works/hindu-and-buddhist-views-proliferation-influence-on-gurdjieffs-teaching?category_id=cgrn&path=cgrn%2F262%2F263|title=Hindu and Buddhist Views Proliferation Influence on Gurdjieff's Teaching}}</ref> As Gurdjieff himself said at a meeting held in his Paris flat during the Second World War: "Our aim is to have constantly a sensation of oneself, of one's individuality: this sensation cannot be expressed intellectually, because it is organic. It is something which makes you independent, when you are with other people."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Transcripts |first=Wartime |title=Wartime Transcripts of Meetings 1941–1946 |page=1 |url=https://bookstudio.co.uk/transcripts-of-gurdjieffs-meetings-1941-1946 |year=2009 |publisher=Book Studio |isbn=978-0-9559090-5-4 |language=en}}</ref>

===Self-development teachings===

{{main|Fourth Way}}

Gurdjieff argued that many of the existing forms of religious and spiritual tradition on Earth had lost connection with their original meaning and vitality and so could no longer serve humanity in the way that had been intended at their inception. As a result, humans were failing to realize the truths of ancient teachings and were instead becoming more and more like automatons, susceptible to control from outside and increasingly capable of otherwise unthinkable acts of [[Mass hysteria|mass psychosis]] such as [[World War I]]. At best, the various surviving sects and schools could provide only a one-sided development, which did not result in a fully integrated human being.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

According to Gurdjieff, only one of the three dimensions of a person—namely, either the emotions, or the physical body or the mind—tends to develop in such schools and sects, and generally at the expense of the other faculties or ''[[Centers (Fourth Way)| centres]],'' as Gurdjieff called them. As a result, these ways fail to produce a properly balanced human being. Furthermore, anyone wishing to undertake any of the traditional paths to spiritual knowledge (which Gurdjieff reduced to three—namely the way of the [[Fakir]], the way of the [[Monk]], and the way of the [[Yogi]]) were required to renounce life in the world. But Gurdjieff also described a "Fourth Way"<ref>[[P. D. Ouspensky]] (1949), ''[[In Search of the Miraculous]],'' Chapter 2</ref> which would be amenable to the requirements of contemporary people living in Europe and America. Instead of training the mind, body and emotions separately, Gurdjieff's discipline worked on all three to promote an organic connection between them and a balanced development.

In parallel with other spiritual traditions, Gurdjieff taught that a person must expend considerable effort to effect the [[Spiritual transformation|transformation]] that leads to [[Mystical experience|awakening]]. Gurdjieff referred to it as "The Work" or "Work on oneself".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gurdjieff.org/index.en.htm |title=Gurdjieff International Review |publisher=Gurdjieff.org |access-date=2014-03-02}}</ref>{{fails verification|date=March 2025}} According to Gurdjieff, "Working on oneself is not so difficult as wishing to work, taking the decision."<ref>{{cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=George |title=Views from the real world |year=1975 |page=[https://archive.org/details/viewsfromrealwor00gurd/page/214 214] |publisher=E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc. |isbn=0-525-47408-0 |url=https://archive.org/details/viewsfromrealwor00gurd/page/214 }}</ref>
Though Gurdjieff never put major significance on the term "Fourth Way" and never used the term in his writings, his pupil [[P. D. Ouspensky]] from 1924 to 1947 made the term and its use central to his own interpretation of Gurdjieff's teaching. After Ouspensky's death, his students published a book titled ''The Fourth Way'' based on his lectures.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Ouspensky|first=P. D.|title=The Fourth Way|publisher=Vintage Books|year=1971|isbn=0-394-71672-8|location=New York|lccn=57-5659|id="An Arrangement by Subject of Verbatim Extracts from the Records of Ouspensky's Meetings in London and New York, 1921–1946"}}</ref>

Gurdjieff's teaching addressed the question of humanity's place in the universe and the importance of developing its latent potentialities—regarded as our natural endowment as human beings, but which was rarely brought to fruition.  He taught that higher levels of consciousness, higher bodies,<ref>[[P. D. Ouspensky]] (1949). ''[[In Search of the Miraculous]]'' Chapter 2</ref> inner growth and development are real possibilities that nonetheless require conscious work to achieve.<ref name="ReferenceA">[[P. D. Ouspensky]] (1971). ''[[The Fourth Way]],'' Chapter 1</ref> The aim was not to acquire anything new but to recover what we had lost.

In his teaching, Gurdjieff gave a distinct meaning to various ancient texts such as the [[Bible]] and many religious prayers. He believed that such texts possess meanings very different from those commonly attributed to them. "Sleep not"; "Awake, for you know not the hour"; and "The Kingdom of Heaven is Within" are examples of biblical statements which point to teachings whose essence has been forgotten.<ref>{{harvnb|Wellbeloved|2003|p=109}}</ref>

Gurdjieff taught people how to strengthen and focus their attention and energy in various ways so as to minimize daydreaming and absentmindedness. According to his teaching, this inner development of oneself is the beginning of a possible further process of change, the aim of which is to transform people into what Gurdjieff believed they ought to be.<ref>[[P. D. Ouspensky]] (1949). ''[[In Search of the Miraculous]],'' Chapter 9.</ref>

Distrusting "morality", which he describes as varying from culture to culture, often contradictory and hypocritical, Gurdjieff greatly stressed the importance of "[[conscience]]".{{cn|date=March 2025}}

To provide conditions in which inner attention could be exercised more intensively, Gurdjieff also taught his pupils "sacred dances" or "movements", later known as the [[Gurdjieff movements]], which they performed together as a group. He also left a body of music, inspired by what he heard in visits to remote monasteries and other places, written for piano in collaboration with one of his pupils, [[Thomas de Hartmann]].{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Gurdjieff used various exercises, such as the "Stop" exercise, to prompt self-observation in his students. Other shocks to help awaken his pupils from constant daydreaming were always possible at any moment.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

===Methods===
The practices associated with Gurdjieff's teachings are not an intellectual pursuit and neither are they new concepts, but are rather practical ways of living "in the moment" so as to allow consciousness of oneself ("self-remembering") to appear. Gurdjieff used a number of methods and materials to wake up his followers, which apart from his own living presence, included meetings, music, movements (sacred dance), writings, lectures, and innovative forms of group and individual work. The purpose of these various methods was to 'put a spanner in the works', so as to permit a connection to be made between mind and body, which is easily talked about, but which has to be experienced to understand what it means. Since each individual is different, Gurdjieff did not have a one-size-fits-all approach and employed different means to impart what he himself had discovered.<ref>"Gurdjieff's teachings were transmitted through special conditions and through special forms leading to consciousness: Group Work, physical labour, crafts, ideas exchanges, arts, music, movement, dance, adventures in nature ... enabled the unrealized individual to transcend the mechanical, acted-upon self and ascend from mere personality to self-actualizing essence."[http://www.seekerbooks.com/book/9780835608404.htm Seekerbooks.com] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080620031630/http://www.seekerbooks.com/book/9780835608404.htm |date=2008-06-20 }}, Book review of Gary Lachman. ''In Search of the Miraculous: Genius in the Shadow of Gurdjieff.''</ref> In Russia he was described as keeping his teaching confined to a small circle,<ref>[[P. D. Ouspensky]] (1949). ''[[In Search of the Miraculous]]m'' Chapter 1,</ref> whereas in Paris and North America, he gave numerous public demonstrations.<ref>[[G.I. Gurdjieff]] (1963) ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men]]'', Chapter 11</ref>

Gurdjieff felt that the traditional methods to acquire self-knowledge—those of the [[Fakir]], [[Monk]], and [[Yogi]] (acquired, respectively, through pain, devotion, and study)—were inadequate on their own to achieve any real understanding. He instead advocated "the way of the sly man"<ref>See ''In Search of the Miraculous''</ref> as a shortcut to encouraging inner development that might otherwise take years of effort and without any real outcome.

====Music====
Gurdjieff's music is divided into three distinct periods. The "first period" is the early music, including music from the ballet ''Struggle of the Magicians'' and music for early movements dating to the years around 1918.

The "second period" music, for which Gurdjieff arguably became best known, written in collaboration with Russian-born composer [[Thomas de Hartmann]], is described as the Gurdjieff-de-Hartmann music.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Petsche|first1=Johanna|title=Gurdjieff and Music: The Gurdjieff/de Hartmann Piano Music and its Esoteric Significance|date=2015|publisher=Brill|location=Leiden|isbn=9789004284425|pages=1–279}}</ref><ref name="Inc.1999">{{cite book|last=Bambarger|first=Bradley|title=Billboard|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iggEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA60|access-date=14 April 2011|date=18 December 1999|publisher=Nielsen Business Media, Inc.|page=60|issn=0006-2510 }}</ref> Dating to the mid-1920s, it offers a rich repertoire with roots in Caucasian and Central Asian folk and religious music, Russian Orthodox liturgical music, and other sources. This music was often first heard in the salon at the Prieuré, where much was composed. Since the publication of four volumes of this piano repertoire by Schott, recently completed, there has been a wealth of new recordings, including orchestral versions of music prepared by Gurdjieff and de Hartmann for the Movements demonstrations of 1923–1924. Solo piano versions of these works have been recorded by [[Cecil Lytle]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://provost.ucsd.edu/marshall/lytle/home/list.html |title=Cecil Lytle&nbsp;– List of Recordings |author=Lytle, Cecil |access-date=30 May 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110825063745/http://provost.ucsd.edu/marshall/lytle/home/list.html |archive-date=25 August 2011 }}</ref> [[Keith Jarrett]],<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.jazzdisco.org/keith-jarrett/discography/ |title=Keith Jarrett Discography |author=Jazz Discography Project |access-date=30 May 2011 }}</ref> and [[Frederic Chiu]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.allmusic.com/album/hymns-dervishes-mw0002908235|title=Hymns and Dervishes Album at AllMusic|date=February 12, 2016|website=AllMusic|publisher=Centaur Records|access-date=2016-09-04}}</ref>

The "last musical period" is the improvised [[Pump organ|harmonium]] music which often followed the dinners Gurdjieff held at his Paris apartment during the Occupation and immediate post-war years to his death in 1949. In all, Gurdjieff in collaboration with de Hartmann composed some 200 pieces.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.gurdjieff.org.uk/gs6.htm|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120829231045/http://www.gurdjieff.org.uk/gs6.htm|url-status=dead|title=Gurdjieff.org|archivedate=August 29, 2012}}</ref> In May 2010, 38 minutes of unreleased solo piano music on [[Acetate disc|acetate]] was purchased by Neil Kempfer Stocker from the estate of his late step-daughter, Dushka Howarth. In 2009, pianist [[Elan Sicroff]] released ''Laudamus: The Music of Georges Ivanovitch Gurdjieff and Thomas de Hartmann'', consisting of a selection of Gurdjieff/de Hartmann collaborations (as well as three early romantic works composed by de Hartmann in his teens).<ref>{{Cite web|title=Elan Sicroff Albums and Discography|url=https://www.allmusic.com/artist/elan-sicroff-mn0000178692/discography|access-date=2023-03-20|website=AllMusic|language=en}}</ref> In 1998 [[Alessandra Celletti]] released "Hidden Sources<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.kha.it/Gurdjieff/gurdjieff_eng.htm|title=Hidden Sources|website=www.kha.it|access-date=2017-11-25|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160521222927/http://www.kha.it/Gurdjieff/gurdjieff_eng.htm|archive-date=2016-05-21|url-status=dead}}</ref>" (Kha Records) with 18 tracks by Gurdjieff/de Hartmann.

The English concert pianist and composer [[Helen Perkin]] (married name Helen Adie) came to Gurdjieff through [[P. D. Ouspensky|Ouspensky]] and first visited Gurdjieff in Paris after the war.<ref>{{ cite periodical
| url= https://www.gurdjieff.org/azize2.htm | last= Azize
| first= Joseph
| title=Helen Adie: An Appreciative Essay
| magazine=  The Gurdjieff International Review 
| volume= 6  | date=2003}}</ref> She and her husband George Adie emigrated to Australia in 1965 and established the Gurdjieff Society of [[Newport, Victoria|Newport]].<ref>Richards, Fiona. 'Helen Perkin: Pianist, Composer and Muse of John Ireland' (Chapter 11 of Foreman, Lewis (ed.), ''The John Ireland Companion'' (2011)</ref> Recordings of her performing music by [[Thomas de Hartmann]] were issued on CD. But she was also a Movements teacher and composed music for the Movements as well. Some of this music has been published and privately circulated.<ref>{{Cite web|date=2019-10-22|title=Helen Adie|url=https://gurdjieffclub.com/en/helen-ejdi/|access-date=2023-03-20|website=Gurdjieff Club|language=en-US}}</ref>

====Movements====
{{main|Gurdjieff movements}}
Movements, or sacred dances, constitute an integral part of the Gurdjieff work. Gurdjieff sometimes referred to himself as a "teacher of dancing" and gained initial public notice for his attempts to put on a ballet in Moscow called ''Struggle of the Magicians.''{{cn|date=March 2025}}

In ''Views from the Real World'' Gurdjieff wrote, "You ask about the aim of the movements. To each position of the body corresponds a certain inner state and, on the other hand, to each inner state corresponds a certain posture. A man, in his life, has a certain number of habitual postures and he passes from one to another without stopping at those between. Taking new, unaccustomed postures enables you to observe yourself inside differently from the way you usually do in ordinary conditions."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Gurdjieff International Review |url=https://www.gurdjieff.org/ |access-date=2022-12-04 |website=www.gurdjieff.org}}</ref>

Films of movements demonstrations are occasionally shown for private viewing by the [[Gurdjieff Foundation]]s, and some examples are shown in a scene in the [[Peter Brook]] movie ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men (film)|Meetings with Remarkable Men]]''.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

==Reception and influence==
Opinions on Gurdjieff's writings and activities are divided. Sympathizers regard him as a charismatic master who brought new knowledge into Western culture, a psychology and cosmology that enable insights beyond those provided by established science.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> [[Rajneesh|Osho]] described Gurdjieff as one of the most significant spiritual masters of this age.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Osho |title=Gurdjieff – Depth – Significance? — OSHO Online Library |url=https://www.osho.com/osho-online-library/osho-talks/gurdjieff-depth-significance-f1889d51-b08?p=d87f5fa803dcf89c365e0bf44058abcd |website=www.shop.osho.com}}</ref> At the other end of the spectrum, some critics assert he was a [[charlatan]] with a large ego and a constant need for self-glorification.<ref>Michael Waldberg (1990). ''Gurdjieff&nbsp;– An Approach to his Ideas'', Chapter 1</ref>

Gurdjieff had a significant influence on some artists, writers, and thinkers, including [[Walter Inglis Anderson]], [[Peter Brook]], [[Kate Bush]], [[Darby Crash]], [[Muriel Draper]], [[Robert Fripp]], [[Keith Jarrett]], [[Timothy Leary]], [[Katherine Mansfield]], [[Dennis Lewis]], [[James Moore (Cornish author)|James Moore]], [[A. R. Orage]], [[P. D. Ouspensky]], [[Maurice Nicoll]], [[Louis Pauwels]], [[Robert S. de Ropp]], [[René Barjavel]], [[Rene Daumal]], [[George Russell (composer)|George Russell]], [[David Sylvian]], [[Jean Toomer]], [[Jeremy Lane (writer)|Jeremy Lane]], [[Therion (band)|Therion]], [[P. L. Travers]], [[Alan Watts]], [[Minor White]], [[Colin Wilson]], [[Robert Anton Wilson]], [[Frank Lloyd Wright]], [[John Zorn]], [[Franco Battiato]] and the British Rock group [[Mystery Jets]].

Gurdjieff's notable personal students include [[P. D. Ouspensky]], [[Olga de Hartmann]], [[Thomas de Hartmann]], [[Jane Heap]], [[Jeanne de Salzmann]], Willem Nyland, [[Henry John Sinclair, 2nd Baron Pentland|Lord Pentland (Henry John Sinclair)]], [[John G. Bennett]], [[Alfred Richard Orage]], [[Maurice Nicoll]], and [[Rene Daumal]].{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Gurdjieff gave new life and practical form to ancient teachings of both East and West. For example, the Socratic and Platonic emphasis on [[know thyself]] recurs in Gurdjieff's teaching as the practice of self-observation. His teachings about self-discipline and restraint reflect Stoic teachings. The Hindu and Buddhist notion of attachment recurs in Gurdjieff's teaching as the concept of identification. His descriptions of the "three being-foods" matches that of [[Ayurveda]], and his statement that "time is breath" echoes Jyotish, the [[Vedic]] system of [[astrology]]. Similarly, his cosmology can be "read" against ancient and esoteric sources, respectively [[Neoplatonic]] and in such sources as Robert Fludd's treatment of macrocosmic musical structures.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

An aspect of Gurdjieff's teachings which has come into prominence in recent decades is the [[Fourth Way Enneagram|enneagram]] geometric figure. For many students of the Gurdjieff tradition, the enneagram remains a [[Kōan|koan]], challenging and never fully explained. There have been many attempts to trace the origins of this version of the enneagram; some similarities to other figures have been found, but it seems that Gurdjieff was the first person to make the enneagram figure publicly known and that only he knew its true source.{{Citation needed|date=February 2010}} Others have used the enneagram figure in connection with personality analysis, principally with the [[Enneagram of Personality]] as developed by [[Oscar Ichazo]], [[Claudio Naranjo]] and others. Most aspects of this application are not directly connected to Gurdjieff's teaching or to his explanations of the enneagram.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

Gurdjieff inspired the formation of many groups around the world after his death, all of which still function today and follow his ideas.<ref>Seymour B. Ginsburg ''Gurdjieff Unveiled'', pp. 71–7, Lighthouse Editions Ltd., 2005 {{ISBN|978-1-904998-01-3}}</ref> The [[Gurdjieff Foundation]], the largest organization influenced by the ideas of Gurdjieff, was organized by [[Jeanne de Salzmann]] during the early 1950s, and led by her in cooperation with fellow pupils of his. Other pupils of Gurdjieff formed independent groups. Willem Nyland, one of Gurdjieff's closest students and an original founder and trustee of The Gurdjieff Foundation of New York, left to form his own groups in the early 1960s. [[Jane Heap]] was sent to London by Gurdjieff, where she led groups until her death in 1964. Louise Goepfert March, who became a pupil of Gurdjieff's in 1929, started her own groups in 1957. Independent thriving groups were also formed and initially led by [[John G. Bennett]] and A. L. Staveley near Portland, Oregon.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

[[Louis Pauwels]], among others,<ref>{{Cite book|last=Lachman |first=Gary |title=Turn off your mind |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8jfptmqzTzkC&q=critics+of+Gurdjieff+work&pg=PA13 |quote=... a hostile book on... Gurdjieff. |page=13 |year=2003 |publisher=The Disinformation Co. |isbn=0-9713942-3-7}}</ref> criticizes Gurdjieff for his insistence on considering people as "asleep" in a state closely resembling "hypnotic sleep". Gurdjieff said, even specifically at times, that a pious, good, and moral person was no more "spiritually developed" than any other person; they are all equally "asleep".<ref>{{cite book |url=http://books.googld.com/books?id=QjetCc6ktOgC&pg=PA110&dq=Gurdjieff+insanity&lr=#v=onepage&q=Gurdjieff%20insanity&f=false |title=Gurdjieff and Orage |first=Paul Beekman |last=Taylor |page=110 |year=2001 |publisher=Samuel Weiser |isbn=978-1-609-25311-0 |quote=...Orage revealed Gurdjieff's views of drugs and alcohol as conducive to 'insanity' }}{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

[[Henry Miller]] approved of Gurdjieff not considering himself holy but, after writing a brief introduction to Fritz Peters' book ''Boyhood with Gurdjieff'', Miller wrote that people are not meant to lead a "harmonious life" as Gurdjieff believed in naming his institute.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Miller |first=Henry |title=From Your Capricorn Friend |url=https://archive.org/details/fromyourcapricor0000mill |url-access=registration |page=[https://archive.org/details/fromyourcapricor0000mill/page/42 42] |year=1984 |publisher=New Directions Publishing |isbn=0-8112-0891-5 |quote=What I intended to say...}}</ref>

In ''Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson'', Gurdjieff expresses his reverence for the founders of the mainstream religions of East and West and his contempt for what successive generations of believers have made of those religious teachings. His discussions of "orthodoxhydooraki" and "heterodoxhydooraki"—orthodox fools and heterodox fools, from the Russian word ''durak'' (fool)—position him as a critic of religious distortion and, in turn, as a target for criticism from some within those traditions. Gurdjieff has been interpreted by some, Ouspensky among others, to have had a total disregard for the value of mainstream religion, philanthropic work and the value of doing right or wrong in general.<ref>{{cite book |last=Ouspensky |first=P. D. |title=In Search of the Miraculous |pages=[https://archive.org/details/insearchofmiracu00uspe/page/299 299–302] |publisher=Harcourt Brace & Co. |year=1977 |isbn=0-15-644508-5 |quote=G. invariably began by emphasizing the fact that there is something very wrong at the basis of our usual attitude towards problems of religion. |url=https://archive.org/details/insearchofmiracu00uspe/page/299}}</ref>

Louis Pauwels wrote ''Monsieur Gurdjieff'' (first edition published in Paris in 1954 by Editions du Seuil).<ref>Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke ''Black Sun'', p. 323, NYU Press, 2003 {{ISBN|978-0-8147-3155-0}}</ref> In an interview, Pauwels said of the Gurdjieff work: "After two years of exercises which both enlightened and burned me, I found myself in a hospital bed with a thrombosed central vein in my left eye and weighing ninety-nine pounds&nbsp;... Horrible anguish and abysses opened up for me. But it was my fault."{{sfn|Needleman|Baker|1997|p=166}}

== Pupils ==
Gurdjieff's notable pupils include:<ref>Gurdjieff: an Annotated Bibliography, J. Walter Driscoll and the Gurdjieff Foundation of California, Garland, 1985.</ref>

[[Peter D. Ouspensky]] (1878–1947) was a Russian journalist, author and philosopher. He met Gurdjieff in 1915 and spent the next five years studying with him, then formed his own independent groups in London in 1921. Ouspensky became the first "career" Gurdjieffian and led independent Fourth Way groups in London and New York for his remaining years. He wrote ''[[In Search of the Miraculous]]'' about his encounters with Gurdjieff and it remains the best-known and most widely read account of Gurdjieff's early experiments with groups.

[[Thomas de Hartmann]] (1885–1956) was a Russian composer. He and his wife Olga first met Gurdjieff in 1916 at Saint Petersburg. They remained Gurdjieff's close students until 1929. During that time they lived at Gurdjieff's Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man near Paris. Between July 1925 and May 1927 Thomas de Hartmann transcribed and co-wrote some of the music that Gurdjieff collected and used for his Movements exercises. They collaborated on hundreds of pieces of concert music arranged for the piano.

This concert music was first recorded and published privately from the 1950s to the 1980s. It was first issued publicly as the ''Music of Gurdjieff / de Hartmann'', Thomas de Hartmann, piano by Triangle Records, with 49 tracks on 4 vinyl disks in 1998, then reissued as a 3-CD set containing 56 tracks in 1989. A more extensive compilation was later issued as the ''Gurdjieff / de Hartmann Music for the Piano'' in 4 printed volumes by Schott, between 1996 and 2005, and as audio CDs under the same title in four volumes, with nine discs recorded with three concert pianists, by Schott/Wergo between 1997 and 2001.

Olga de Hartmann (née Arkadievna de Schumacher; 1885–1979) was Gurdjieff's personal secretary during their Prieuré years<ref>{{harvnb|Wellbeloved|2003|p=235}}</ref> and took most of the original dictations of his writings during that period. She also authenticated Gurdjieff's early talks in the book ''Views from the Real World'' (1973). The de Hartmanns' memoir, ''Our Life with Mr Gurdjieff'' (1st ed, 1964, 2nd ed, 1983, 3rd ed 1992), records their Gurdjieff years in great detail. Their Montreal Gurdjieff group, literary and musical estate is represented by retired Canadian [[National Film Board]] producer Tom Daly.

[[Jeanne de Salzmann]] (1889–1990). Alexander and Jeanne de Salzmann met Gurdjieff in Tiflis in 1919. She was originally a dancer and a Dalcroze Eurythmics teacher. She was, along with Jessmin Howarth and Rose Mary Nott, responsible for transmitting Gurdjieff's choreographed movement exercises and institutionalizing Gurdjieff's teachings through the [[Gurdjieff Foundation]] of New York, the Gurdjieff Institute of Paris, London's Gurdjieff Society Inc., and other groups she established in 1953. She also established Triangle Editions in the US, which imprint claims copyright on all Gurdjieff's posthumous writings.

[[John G. Bennett]] (1897–1974) was a British intelligence officer, polyglot (fluent in English, French, German, Turkish, Greek, and Italian), technologist, industrial research director, author, and teacher, best known for his many books on psychology and spirituality, particularly the teachings of Gurdjieff. Bennett met both Ouspensky and then Gurdjieff at Istanbul in 1920, spent August 1923 at Gurdjieff's Institute, became Ouspensky's pupil between 1922 and 1941 and, after learning that Gurdjieff was still alive, was one of Gurdjieff's frequent visitors in Paris during 1949. See ''Witness: the Autobiography of John Bennett'' (1974), ''Gurdjieff: Making a New World''(1974), ''Idiots in Paris: diaries of J. G. Bennett and Elizabeth Bennett, 1949'' (1991).

[[Alfred Richard Orage]] (1873–1934) was an influential British editor best known for the magazine ''New Age''. He began attending Ouspensky's London talks in 1921 and then met Gurdjieff when the latter first visited London early in 1922. Shortly thereafter, Orage sold ''New Age'' and relocated to Gurdjieff's institute at the Prieré, and in 1924 was appointed by Gurdjieff to lead the institute's branch in New York. After Gurdjieff's nearly fatal automobile accident in July 1924 and because of his prolonged recuperation during 1924 and intense writing period for several years, Orage continued in New York until 1931. During this period, Orage was responsible for editing the English typescript of ''Beelzebub's Tales'' (1931) and ''Meetings with Remarkable Men'' (1963) as Gurdjieff's assistant. This period is described in some detail by Paul Beekman Taylor in his ''Gurdjieff and Orage: Brothers in Elysium'' (2001).

[[Maurice Nicoll]] (1884–1953) was a Harley Street psychiatrist and [[Carl Jung]]'s delegate in London. Along with Orage, he attended Ouspensky's 1921 London talks where he met Gurdjieff. With his wife Catherine and their daughter, he spent almost a year at Gurdjieff's Prieuré Institute. A year later, when they returned to London, Nicoll rejoined Ouspensky's group. In 1931, on Ouspensky's advice, he started his own Fourth Way groups in England. He is best known for the encyclopedic six-volume series of articles in ''Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky'' (Boston: Shambhala, 1996, and Samuel Weiser Inc., 1996).

Willem Nyland (1890–1975) was a Dutch-American chemist who first met Gurdjieff early in 1924 during the latter's first visit to the US. He was a charter member of the NY branch of Gurdjieff's Institute, participated in Orage's meetings between 1924 and 1931, and was a charter member of the Gurdjieff Foundation from 1953 and through its formative years. In the early 1960s he established an independent group in Warwick NY, where he began making reel-to-reel audio recordings of his meetings, which became archived in a private library of some 2600 90-minute audio tapes. Many of these tapes have also been transcribed and indexed, but remain unpublished. ''Gurdjieff Group Work with Wilhem (sic-Willem) Nyland'' (1983) by Irmis B. Popoff, sketches Nyland's group work.

[[Jane Heap]] (1883–1964) was an American writer, editor, artist, and publisher. She met Gurdjieff during his 1924 visit to New York, and set up a Gurdjieff study group at her apartment in Greenwich Village. In 1925, she moved to Paris to study at Gurdjieff's Institute, and re-established her group in Paris until 1935 when Gurdjieff sent her to London to lead the group that C. S. Nott had established and which she continued to lead until her death. Jane Heap's Paris group became Gurdjieff's 'Rope' group after her departure, and contained several notable writers, including [[Margaret C. Anderson|Margaret Anderson]], [[Solita Solano]], [[Kathryn Hulme]], and others who proved helpful to Gurdjieff while he was editing his first two books.

Kenneth Macfarlane Walker (1882–1966) was a prominent British surgeon and prolific author. He was a member of Ouspensky's London group for decades, and after the latter's death in 1947 visited Gurdjieff in Paris many times. As well as many accessible medical books for lay readers, he wrote some of the earliest informed accounts of Gurdjieff's ideas, ''Venture with Ideas'' (1951) and ''A Study of Gurdjieff's Teaching'' (1957).

[[Henry John Sinclair, 2nd Baron Pentland]] (1907–1984), was a pupil of Ouspensky's during the 1930s and 1940s. He visited Gurdjieff regularly in Paris in 1949, then was appointed as President of the Gurdjieff Foundation of America by Jeanne de Salzmann when she founded that institution in New York in 1953. He established the Gurdjieff Foundation of California in the mid-1950s and remained President of the US Foundation branches until his death. Pentland also became President of Triangle Editions when it was established in 1974.

==Writings==
Three books by Gurdjieff were published in the English language in the United States after his death: ''[[Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson]]'' published in 1950 by E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc., ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men]]'', published in 1963 by E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc., and ''[[Life Is Real Only Then, When 'I Am'|Life is Real Only Then, When 'I Am']]'', printed privately by E. P. Dutton & Co. and published in 1978 by Triangle Editions Inc. for private distribution only. This [[trilogy]] is Gurdjieff's legominism, known collectively as ''[[All and Everything]]''. A ''legominism'' is, according to Gurdjieff, "one of the means of transmitting information about certain events of long-past ages through initiates". A book of his early talks was also collected by his student and personal secretary, [[Olga de Hartmann]], and published in 1973 as ''[[Views from the Real World|Views from the Real World: Early Talks in Moscow, Essentuki, Tiflis, Berlin, London, Paris, New York, and Chicago, as recollected by his pupils]]''.

Gurdjieff's views were initially promoted through the writings of his pupils. The best known and widely read of these is [[P. D. Ouspensky]]'s ''[[In Search of the Miraculous|In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching]]'', which is widely regarded as a crucial introduction to the teaching. Others refer to Gurdjieff's own books as the primary texts. Numerous anecdotal accounts of time spent with Gurdjieff were published by [[Charles Stanley Nott]], [[Thomas and Olga de Hartmann]], Fritz Peters, [[René Daumal]], [[John G. Bennett]], [[Maurice Nicoll]], [[Margaret C. Anderson|Margaret Anderson]] and [[Louis Pauwels]], among others.

The feature film ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men (film)|Meetings with Remarkable Men]]'' (1979), loosely based on Gurdjieff's book by the same name, ends with performances of Gurdjieff's dances known simply as the "exercises" but later promoted as ''[[Movements (sacred dances)|movements]]''. [[Jeanne de Salzmann]] and Peter Brook wrote the film, Brook directed, and Dragan Maksimovic and [[Terence Stamp]] star, as does South African playwright and actor [[Athol Fugard]].{{sfn|Needleman|Baker|1997|pp=28ff}}

Gurdjieff wrote a trilogy with the Series title ''All and Everything''. The first volume, finalized by Gurdjieff shortly before his death and first published in 1950, is the First Series and titled ''[[An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man]]'' or ''[[Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson]]''. At 1238 pages it is a lengthy allegorical work that recounts the explanations of Beelzebub to his grandson concerning the beings of the planet Earth and laws which govern the universe. It provides a vast platform for Gurdjieff's deeply considered philosophy. A controversial redaction of ''Beelzebub's Tales'' was published by some of Gurdjieff's followers as an alternative "edition", in 1992.

On his page of ''Friendly Advice'' facing the first Contents page of ''Beelzebub's Tales'' Gurdjieff lays out his own program of three obligatory initial readings of each of the three series in sequence and concludes, "Only then will you be able to count upon forming your own impartial judgement, proper to yourself alone, on my writings. And only then can my hope be actualized that according to your understanding you will obtain the specific benefit for your self which I anticipate."

The posthumous second series, edited by [[Jeanne de Salzmann]], is titled ''[[Meetings with Remarkable Men]]'' (1963) and is written in a seemingly accessible manner as a memoir of his early years, but also contains some 'Arabian Nights' embellishments and allegorical statements. His posthumous Third Series, (''[[Life Is Real Only Then, When 'I Am']]''), written as if unfinished and also edited by Jeanne de Salzmann, contains an intimate account of Gurdjieff's inner struggles during his later years, as well as transcripts of some of his lectures. An enormous and growing amount has been written about Gurdjieff's ideas and methods, but his own challenging writings remain the primary sources.

=== List of books by Gurdjieff ===
* {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/317688869 |title=The Herald of Coming Good: First Appeal to Contemporary Humanity |date=1974 |publisher=S. Weiser |isbn=0-87728-049-5 |oclc=317688869 |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/785823922 |title=Transcripts of Gurdjieff's Meetings 1941–1946 |date=2009 |isbn=978-0-9559090-5-4 |edition=Second |location=London |publisher=Book Studio |oclc=785823922 |ref=none}}
*''All and Everything'' trilogy:
** {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/1293986698 |title=Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson |date=10 November 2021 |publisher=Rare Treasure Editions |isbn=978-1-77464-427-0 |oclc=1293986698 |ref=none}}
** {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/1363838370 |title=Meetings with Remarkable Men |date=2021 |publisher=Rare Treasure Editions |isbn=978-1-77464-407-2 |oclc=1363838370 |ref=none}}
** {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/41073474 |title=Life is Real Only Then, When 'I Am' |date=1999 |isbn=978-0-14-019585-9 |location=London |publisher=Arkana |oclc=41073474 |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovich |url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/847108580 |title=Views From the Real World: Early Talks in Moscow, Essentuki, Tiflis, Berlin, London, Paris, New York and Chicago. |date=1984 |publisher=Arkana |isbn=0-7100-8332-7 |oclc=847108580 |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/876287850 |title=The Struggle of the Magicians: Scenario of the Ballet |date=2014 |isbn=978-0-9572481-2-0 |location=London |publisher=Book Studio |oclc=876287850 |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=Georges Ivanovitch |editor-last=Grant |editor-first1=Stephen A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PUwibT27qdIC |title=In Search of Being: The Fourth Way to Consciousness |date=2012 |publisher=[[Shambhala Publications]] |isbn=978-1-61180-037-1 |language=en |oclc=794359168 |ref=none}}

== Notes and quotes ==
{{notelist}}

== References ==
===Citations===
{{Reflist}}

=== Works cited ===
{{refbegin}}
* {{Cite book |last=Bennet |first=John G. |title=Gurdjieff: A Very Great Enigma |date=1984 |publisher=S. Weiser New York |isbn=978-0-87728-581-6 }} 
* {{Cite book |last=Churton |first=Tobias |title=Deconstructing Gurdjieff: Biography of a Spiritual Magician |date=2017 |publisher=[[Simon & Schuster]] |isbn=978-1-62055-639-9}}
* {{Cite book |last1=de Hartmann |first1=Thomas |last2=de Hartmann |first2=Olga |title=Our Life with Mr. Gurdjieff |publisher=Cooper Square Publishers |year=1964}}
* {{Cite book |last=Gurdjieff |first=George Ivanovitch |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ok4RAQAAIAAJ |title=Meetings with Remarkable men |date=1963 |publisher=[[E. P. Dutton]]}}
* {{Cite book |last=Lang |first=David |title=The Armenians: A People in Exile |date=1988 |publisher=Unwin |isbn=978-0-04-440289-3 }}
* {{Cite book |last=Lipsey |first=Roger |title=Gurdjieff Reconsidered: The Life, the Teachings, the Legacy |date=2019 |publisher=[[Shambhala Publications]] |isbn=978-1-61180-451-5}}
* {{Cite book |last=Moore |first=James |title=Gurdjieff: A Biography |date=1999 |publisher= Element |isbn=978-1-86204-606-1 }}
* {{Cite book |editor1-last=Needleman |editor1-first=Jacob |editor2-last=Baker |editor2-first=George |title=Gurdjieff: Essays and Reflections on the Man and His Teachings |year=1997 |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |isbn=978-0-8264-1049-8}}
* {{Cite book |last=Pittman |first=Michael  |title=G. I. Gurdjieff: Armenian Roots. Global Branches |date=2008 |publisher=Cambridge Scholars |isbn=978-1-4438-0019-8 }}
* {{Cite book |last=Pittman |first=Michael S. |title=Classical Spirituality in Contemporary America: The Confluence and Contribution of G. I. Gurdjieff and Sufism |date=2012 |publisher=[[Continuum International Publishing Group|Bloomsbury Publishing]] |isbn=978-1-4411-8545-7}}
* {{Cite book |last=Shirley |first=John |title=Gurdjieff: An Introduction to His Life and Ideas |date=2004 |publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-1-4406-2121-5}}
* {{Cite book |last=Tamdgidi |first=Mohammad H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Sae_AAAAQBAJ |title=Gurdjieff and Hypnosis: A Hermeneutic Study |date=2009 |publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]] |isbn=978-0-230-10202-6 |language=en}}
* {{Cite book |last=Taylor |first=Paul Beekman |title=G. I. Gurdjieff: A Life |date=2020 |publisher=Eureka Editions |isbn=978-94-92590-15-2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Tchekhovitch |first=Tcheslaw |title=Gurdjieff: A Master in Life |date=2006 |publisher=Dolmen Meadow Editions |isbn=978-0-9780661-0-9 }}
* {{Cite book |last=Webb |first=James |title=The Harmonious Circle: The Lives and Work of G. I. Gurdjieff, P. D. Ouspensky and their Followers |date=1987 |publisher=Shambhala |isbn=978-0-87773-427-7 }}
* {{Cite book |last=Wellbeloved |first=Sophia |author-link=Sophia Wellbeloved |title=Gurdjieff: The Key Concepts |date=2003 |publisher=[[Routledge]] |isbn=978-1-135-13249-1}}
{{refend}}

==Further reading==
{{refbegin}}
* {{Cite book |last=Bennet |first=John |title=Witness: The Story of a Search |date=1962 |publisher=Hodder and Stoughton |isbn=1881408027 |language=en |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |last=Bennet |first=John G |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t6E8AAAAYAAJ |title=Gurdjieff: Making a New World |date=1973 |publisher=Turnstone Books |isbn=9780855000196 | language=en |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |first=T. |last=Brass |title=Enneagram |publisher=Kharkadeh |year=2018 |isbn=978-0-9566309-2-6}}
* {{Cite book |last=Recollections |first=Pupils |url=http://www.gurdjieff.am/library/views.pdf |title=Views From the Real World |date=1973 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=0525228705 |language=en |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |first=Jean |last=Vaysse |title=Toward Awakening, An Approach to the Teaching Left by Gurdjieff |place=London |publisher=Routledge & Kegan Paul |year=1980 |isbn=0-7100-07159}}
{{refend}}

==External links==
{{Wikiquote}}
{{Commons category|G. I. Gurdjieff}}
<!-- ATTENTION. Only websites reasonably discussing Gurdjieff can be added. Gurdjieff/Ouspensky/Fourth Way related GROUPS' websites, advertising sites, as well as "one paragraph opinion sites" do not belong here and will be removed.-->
* [http://www.institut-gurdjieff.com/iagf/ International Association of Gurdjieff Foundations]
* [http://www.Gurdjieff-Bibliography.com/ Gurdjieff Reading Guide compiled by J. Walter Driscoll]. Fifty-two articles which provide an independent survey of the literature by or about George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff and offer a wide range of informed opinions (admiring, critical, and contradictory) about him, his activities, writings, philosophy, and influence.
* Writings on Gurdjieff's teachings in the [http://hdl.handle.net/10079/fa/beinecke.andersonm Elizabeth Jenks Clark Collection of Margaret Anderson Papers] at Yale University Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
* [http://archives.nypl.org/dan/22717 Howarth Gurdjieff Archive] at The New York Public Library
* [https://ggurdjieff.com/ George Gurdjieff: "Seeker of Truth"] A video documentary on Gurdjieff's life and teaching.
* [http://www.Gurdjieff.am Gurdjieff.am]

{{George Gurdjieff}}
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