G. I. Gurdjieff • Meetings with Remarkable Men

G. I. Gurdjieff • Meetings with Remarkable Men

Written in Russian, the manuscript of this book was begun in 1927 and revised by the author over a period of many years. The first English translation by A. R. Orage has been revised and reworked from the Russian for this publication.

Who was Gurdjieff?

George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff was born in 1877 in Alexandropol, near the Persian frontier of Russia, where the ancient traditions of patriarchal were still a living influence. After his family had suffered great losses and moved to Kars, his father’s friend, the dean of the Cathedral, took charge of the boy’s education and arranged for him to be trained both as a priest and a physician. While supporting himselv to persue this studies, Gurdjieff acquired unusual dexterity in many trades.

During the period which followed, lasting perhaps some twenty years, Gurdjieff “disappeared”. It is known only that he traveled in the remotest regions of central Asia and that these years were crucial in the moulding of his thought. Ouspensky quotes him as saying later: “I was not alone. There were all sorts of specialists among us. Afterwards when we forgathered we put together everything we had founds.”

In Meetings with Remarkable Men, Gurdjieff himself introduces us to some of his companions. With colorful episodes from their adventures, he brings to life the story of his own unremitting search for a real and universal knowledge. But although his narrative has the undeniable ring of authenticity, the sense of mystery surrounding the truths he discovered is left intact. Meeting with Remarkable Men can be read as a colorful narrative or psychological autobiography, but the meaning of its content can be best appreciated in relation to the expositions of Gurdjieff’s ideas, previously published in All and Everything, or Beelzebub’s Tells to His Grandson.

“No one who came into personal contact with Gurdjieff ever failed to be impressed by him and by the range of his knowledge. There is no doubt that he has an important message for humanity in this critical period of its history” – Kenneth Walker, Sunday Times.

Picador, Paperback, english, 303 pages