The most complete, comprehensive account of the life and work of George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, one of the greatest men of the 20th century, and the only one which attempts to describe his mission. Since Gurdjieff's death in 1949, countless books have been written describing an author's experience with him, in more or less personal detail. This is the first and only book written by an associate of Gurdjieff, presenting an overview of Gurdjieff's life, cultural background, studies, teachings, practices, cosmology, psychology and goals. The author encountered Gurdjieff first in Istanbul in 1920, saw him again in London and the Prieure, Fontainebleau, lost touch with him for 25 years and saw him again in Paris and New York in the last two years of his life. He devoted the last 25 years of his own life to researching and transmitting Gurdjieff's teachings. As the title suggests, the author identifies Gurdjieff's work as nothing less than the inauguration of a new epoch of human evolution, based upon a new understanding of the meaning of "Conscience"; a model based not upon the supremacy of the individual and humanity as a whole, but upon cooperation with both higher and lower powers. The twelve chapters and two appendices are written as a series of essays, which can be read either sequentially or separately. The second appendix gives an account of a cosmological system that is parallel to but entirely separate from the Ray of Creation described in detail in Ouspensky's "In Search of the Miraculous.""

From a master biographer and longtime Gurdjieff practitioner, a brilliant new exploration of the quintessential Western esoteric teacher of the twentieth-century. The Greek-Armenian teacher G.I. Gurdjieff was one of the most original and provocative spiritual teachers in the twentieth-century West. Whereas much work on Gurdjieff has been either fawning or blindly critical, acclaimed scholar and writer Roger Lipsey balances sympathic interest in Gurdjieff and his "Fourth Way" teachings with a historian's sense of context and a biographer's feel for personality and relationships. Using a wide-range of published and unpublished sources, Lipsey explores Gurdjieff's formative travels in Central Asia, his famed teaching institution in France, the development of the Gurdjieff Movements and music, and, above all, Gurdjieff's fascinating continuous evolution as a teacher. Published on the 70th anniversary of Gurdjieff's death, Gurdjieff Reconsidered delves deeply into Gurdjieff's writings and those of his most important students, including P. D. Ouspensky and Jeanne de Salzmann. Lipsey's comprehensive approach and unerring sense of the subject make this a must-read for anyone with a serious intention to explore Gurdjieff's life, teachings, and reputation.

From a master biographer and longtime Gurdjieff practitioner, a brilliant new exploration of the quintessential Western esoteric teacher of the twentieth-century. The Greek-Armenian teacher G.I. Gurdjieff was one of the most original and provocative spiritual teachers in the twentieth-century West. Whereas much work on Gurdjieff has been either fawning or blindly critical, acclaimed scholar and writer Roger Lipsey balances sympathic interest in Gurdjieff and his "Fourth Way" teachings with a historian's sense of context and a biographer's feel for personality and relationships. Using a wide-range of published and unpublished sources, Lipsey explores Gurdjieff's formative travels in Central Asia, his famed teaching institution in France, the development of the Gurdjieff Movements and music, and, above all, Gurdjieff's fascinating continuous evolution as a teacher. Published on the 70th anniversary of Gurdjieff's death, Gurdjieff Reconsidered delves deeply into Gurdjieff's writings and those of his most important students, including P. D. Ouspensky and Jeanne de Salzmann. Lipsey's comprehensive approach and unerring sense of the subject make this a must-read for anyone with a serious intention to explore Gurdjieff's life, teachings, and reputation.