Deconstructing Gurdjieff

Britain’s leading scholar of Western Esotericism, Tobias Churton is a world authority on Gnosticism, Hermeticism, and Rosicrucianism. An Honorary Fellow of Exeter University, where he is a faculty lecturer, he holds a master’s degree in Theology from Brasenose College, Oxford, and is the author of many books, including Aleister Crowley: The Beast in Berlin and Occult Paris. He lives in the heart of England.

• Acknowledgments Preface: Caveat Lector ONE The Enigma Arrives Meeting the Press TWO Reviewing the Situation: A Birth Archival Records Cattle Plague THREE War Baby: An Education in Kars FOUR Dean Borshch and Other Enthusiasms The Circle of the Yezidi Bogachevsky and the Flying Chairs FIVE The Spiritual Question Miracles Spiritualism and Hypnosis SIX Mad about the Girl: Or How to Get to Tiflis in a Hurry Fedeev and Blavatsky Tiflis SEVEN Books: Furniture of the Mind The Tradition The Brotherhood of the Rose-Cross EIGHT In Search of Brotherhood The Armenian Question Ani NINE The Yezidis The God of the Yezidis Melek Tawus Yezidi Beliefs Origins TEN Do-It-Yourself Gurdjieff and Unaccountable Journeys Miscellaneous Adventures The Sufis Back to Work with Gurdjieff ELEVEN Traveling Tales and Bullets in the Leg Soloviev and the Kushka Line Toward the Sarmoung Monastery TWELVE Two More Bullets Trouble in Tibet The Chiatura Tunnel THIRTEEN Holy Mother Russia! Papus in Russia The Unique Work Brotherhood FOURTEEN The Struggle of the Magicians FIFTEEN Octave and Enneagram From Seven to EightNine in the Circle SIXTEEN The International Alliance of Ideological Workers Tbilisi SEVENTEEN Stateless Person Constantinople John Godolphin Bennett, Prince Sabahaddin, and Gurdjieff EIGHTEEN Doctrine: An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man NINETEEN The Beast 666 and the Black Devil TWENTY The Long Ascent Breaking with Old Friends The War TWENTY-ONE The Grave with No Name Notes Bibliography Index

"Churton's remarkable ability to make a coherent narrative out of disparate information while also weaving in other research interests, such as the influence of Aleister Crowley, makes this a valuable resource for those familiar with Gurdjieff's work, and it's easily readable for those coming fresh to the topic."