Gurdjieff Reconsidered by Roger Lipsey & Cynthia Bourgeault

Author:Roger Lipsey & Cynthia Bourgeault
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Shambhala
Published: 2019-02-04T16:00:00+00:00

Between the tiger-tamer and the old man helping others in godlike fashion lay the decade of the 1930s, its darkness and light. It would be an error to give too much emphasis to either. There were many luminous episodes in the period, innumerable moments when the spark of life and truth between the women of the Rope and their stormy teacher was all that mattered, fulfilling beyond measure. “Life…life…,” they remembered Gurdjieff to have said, “truth, sometimes I even like…much material for rejoicings and satisfactions.”61 A reluctant acknowledgment; acknowledgment nonetheless. On occasion there was also pungent humor of a kind common to Gurdjieff and his distant predecessor, Rabelais. I will spare you the opening round of a conversation at the Café de la Paix about novel money-making schemes—suffice it to say that he and members of the Rope were working out a new sort of sausage business. It had something to do with horse and chicken meat. “G. says he has plan for even better business—instead of using chicken, will use a sparrow. Could use a canary, but canary expensive because sometimes sing a little. One horse, one sparrow—good business. But even better—could use one horse, and one venereal louse. With such combination as this would make most money of all.”62 Do you see what I mean: Surreal? Rabelais and few others would dive into a topic of this kind with such mock seriousness.

And then there were times of greatest kindness in which all was well with the world and with the little world of the Rope. In Georgette Leblanc’s telling, Christmas Eve 1936 was such an occasion.

Extraordinary reunion at his flat tonight. Another age—a patriarch distributing treasures. The little apartment was full—his family, friends of his family, the concierge and his family, old servants from other days. The Christmas tree, too big, too high, was bent against the ceiling and its stars hung down. The distribution of gifts was a true ceremony. Fifty or more large boxes, numbered, occupied a corner of the salon. Gurdjieff, standing in front of a table, glasses on his nose, held a list in his hand. To each box that was set before him he added notes of a hundred or five hundred francs; then he called a name corresponding to a number and presented the box, making the brief gesture that signifies “Don’t thank me.”…At ten o’clock supper was served. On each plate was an enormous piece of mutton, a stuffed Russian roll, pickles, peppers preserved in oil—all the things I hold in horror; but superb desserts were spread out—cakes, fruits, candies of a thousand-and-one nights. We left at midnight and other people took our places. The Russian maid said to me, “From one o’clock till dawn the poor will be coming.”63

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