|
Date
|
|
Event
|
| 1866
| ?Jan. |
G. born in Cappadocian Greek quarter of Alexandropol on Russian side of Russo-Turkish border.
|
| 1870-72
| |
Birth of G.'s only brother Dmitri Ivanovitch Gurdjieff (?1870) and eldest sister (?1871).
|
| 1873
| summer |
G.'s father Giorgios Giorgiades, impoverished when rinderpest wipes out his large cattle herd, opens a lumber-yard.
|
| 1874-76
| |
Birth of two further sisters.
|
| 1877
| |
Giorgiades' lumber-yard fails and he opens a small carpentry shop. G. precociously begins to contribute to family income. Russia declares war on Turkey (24 Apr.) and captures Turkish border citadel town of Kars (18 Nov.).
|
| 1878
| |
Giorgiades
moves his family to Kars, and re-establishes his carpentry shop in the
Greek quarter. Father Dean Borsh of Russian military cathedral assumes
responsibility for G.'s private education, co-opting as tutors four
graduates of the Theological Seminary. G. reads intensively in library
of Kars military hospital.
|
| 1879-80
| |
G. falls under moral influence of his tutor Dean Bogachevsky.
|
| 1881
| |
G.'s
eldest and favourite sister dies. G. narrowly escapes death in
shooting accident on Lake Alageuz. He becomes fascinated by witnessing
certain 'paranormal phenomena'.
|
| 1882
| |
In an adolescent duel of sorts with Piotr Karpenko, G. narrowly escapes death on an artillery range.
|
| 1883
| |
Leaving
home, G. moves to Tiflis but fails to enter the Archdeacon's choir or
the Georgian Theological Seminary. During breaks from casual work as a
stoker for the Transcaucasian Railway Company, he makes pilgrimage on
foot to Echmiadzin and studies for three months at Sanaine Monastery
under Father Yevlampios. He develops close friendships with Sarkis
Pogossian and Abram Yelov.
|
| 1884
| |
G. crystallizes his motivational question as to significance of organic and human life.
|
| 1885
| summer |
G.
visits Constantinople (where he meets Ekim Bey) to study the Mevlevi
and Bektashi dervishes. He returns to Alexandropol, where his parents
now again live, via Hadji Bektash, Konya, and Aksehir.
|
| 1886
| |
G.
and Pogossian, digging haphazardly in the ruined city of Ani, find
reference to the 'Sarmoung Brotherhood', supposedly a wisdom school
founded in Babylon c. 2500 BC.
|
| 1887
| |
As
a courier of the Armenian protectionist society, the Armenakans, G.
sets out with Pogossian for Kurdistan, quixotically resolved to 'find
the Sarmoung'. En route however, his chance discovery near Zakho of a
'map of pre-sand Egypt' diverts him circuitously to Alexandria (where
Pogossian leaves him). In Cairo, G. makes a strong bond with two elder
seekers: Prince Yuri Lubovedsky and Professor Skridlov.
|
| 1888-9
| |
G.
visits Thebes with Lubovedsky; Abyssinia and the Sudan with Skridlov;
and Mecca and Medina alone and in disguise. G. and Skridlov visit
remains of Babylon at Nippur, Iraq. Returning to Constantinople, G.
meets Vitvitskaia and escorts her to Russia.
|
| 1890-93
| |
As
a political envoy (probably of the newly constituted Armenian Social
Revolutionary Party, the Dashnakzutiun) G. visits Switzerland and
subsequently bases himself in Rome.
|
| 1894-5
| |
Sultan Abdul Hamid II instigates massacre of Armenians throughout Turkey.
Again centred on Alexandropol, G. is prime mover in the foundation
(1895) of the 'Seekers of Truth', a heterogeneous and youthful grouping
seeking traditional and esoteric knowledge.
|
| 1896
| |
G.
goes to Crete, seeking traces of the ancient 'Imastun brotherhood', but
also as an agent of the Ethniki Hetairia, a Hellenist Spartacist
society. The Greek population revolts (Feb.) against Turks. While in the Sfakia region, G. is shot
[TS7]
and evacuated, unconscious, to Jerusalem. He recuperates at Alexandropol.
|
| 1897
| |
Accompanying the Seekers of Truth, G. sets out [M183]
from Nakhichevan (1 Jan.) through Turkestan to Tabriz and Baghdad
(Expedition 1). (Episode of Ekim Bey and the Persian dervish.) To
facilitate wider travels in Central Asia, G. becomes a Tsarist political
agent and ? establishes some connection with the Buryat Mongol Agwhan
Dordjieff, a high Tibetan official. With the Seekers G. travels from
Orenburg through Sverdlovsk to Siberia (Expedition 2).
|
| 1898
| |
In
New Bokhara (Easter) G. befriends Soloviev a physical and social
derelict. Guided blindfold by intermediaries on a twelve-day pony-trek
from Bokhara, G. and Soloviev gain access to the chief Sarmoung
Monastery (purported source of G.'s profoundest insights, symbolism and
Sacred Dances). Unexpectedly they find Lubovedsky already there but in
failing health. To G.'s sorrow, Lubovedsky promptly leaves to end his
days under spiritual supervision elsewhere. Following a period of
monastic study, G. explores the Gobi (?Taklamakan) desert with Skridlov
and the Seekers of Truth (Expedition 3). After Soloviev's accidental
death
[M165], G. returned to Keriya Oasis.
|
| 1899
| |
G.
stays in Merv. In dervish disguise he and Skridlov travel up the river
Amu Darya (Oxus) into Kafiristan. (Episode of Skridlov and Father
Giovanni.) G. returns to Baku and studies Persian magic. In Ashkhabad
he and Vitvitskaia (only woman member of the Seekers) earn large sums
with his 'Universal Traveling Workshop'.
|
| 1900
| |
G. sets out (2 Jan.) from Chardzhou with Seekers (Expedition 4) through the Pamirs to India [M252]. (Episode of Karpenko and the ez-ezounavouron.) The Seekers then disband and separate.
|
| 1901
| |
?
G. presented to Tsar Nicholoas II (23 July) in Livadia. ? Disguised as
a Transcaspian Buddhist, G. enters Upper Tibet and studies with the
'Red Hat' Lamas. ? He marries a Tibetan.
|
| 1902
| |
Shot a second time [TS9]
during a mountain clan affray, G. recovers in the Yangi Hissar oasis on
the edge of the Taklamakan desert. He takes an oath to abjure
hypnotism and animal magnetism except for scientific and altruistic
purposes.
|
| 1903
| |
G. returns to Tibet. Col. Francis Younghusband invades Tibet (5 Jul.) from India.
|
| 1904
| |
British massacre Tibetans at Guru (31 Mar.) Younghusband enters Lhasa (3 Aug.).
Anguished at the untimely killing of an initiated lama, G. resolves to
combat the mass suggestibility and hysteria which occasion wars.
Hydropsy obliges him to leave Tibet and return to his parents in
Alexandropol. Having recuperated, G. sets out again (winter) for
Central Asia but, near the Chiatura railway tunnel, is accidentally shot
a third time
[TS9] in a skirmish between Cossacks and Gourians. With difficulty he goes via Ashkabad to Yangi Hissar where he again recuperates.
|
| 1905-7
| |
?After
two years in an indeterminate Central Asian Sufi community, G. settles
in Tashkent, the Uzbek capital of Russian Turkestan. He briefly visits
Samara, comforting Vitvitskaia on her deathbed.
|
|
| |
(Back
to top of page)
|
| 1908-10
| |
Based
in Tashkent as a 'Professor-instructor' in supernatural sciences, G.
begins teaching in a deliberately charlatanesque mode, while studying
the reaction among his Europeanized Russian 'guinea-pigs'. He amasses
considerable wealth by trading in oil, fish, cattle, carpets, cloisonné,
etc. Slowly he gravitates west towards metropolitan Russia.
|
| 1911
| |
G.
synthesizes disparate stands of accumulated knowledge into a cohesive
system employing a special and at points quasi-scientific, vocabulary.
On 13 Sept. he renews his oath [H11] to abjure hypnotism, etc., binding himself for twenty-one years to lead an 'artificial life'.
|
| 1912
| c. New Year |
G.
arrives in Moscow and attracts his first associates (his cousin Sergei
Mercourov, Vladimir Pohl, and Rachmilievitch). ? G. marries Julia
Ostrowska in St Petersburg.
|
|
| mid. |
G. reads Tertium Organum, identifying its author P.D. Ouspensky as a prospective pupil.
|
| 1913
| |
In St Petersburg, under the assumed name of 'Prince Ozay', G. cultivates Lev Lvovitch (?and Shamzaran Badmieff).
|
|
| winter |
In St Petersburg G. informally takes his first English pupil, the musical student Paul Dukes.
|
| 1914
| spring |
In St Petersburg (having abandoned 'Prince Ozay' persona) G. interests Dr Leonid Stjoernval.
|
|
| Aug. 1 |
Germany declares war on Russia. (St Peterburg renamed Petrograd on Sept. 1).
|
|
| Nov. 13 |
G. advertises his ballet, The Struggle of the Magicians, in Golos Moskvi (attracting Ouspensky's attention).
|
|
| Dec. |
G. supervises his pupils' writing of sketch, Glimpses of Truth.
|
| 1915
| April |
In Moscow G. accepts Ouspensky as pupil. (A week later Ouspensky returns to Petrograd.)
|
|
| autumn |
G. intermittently visits Petrograd where he lectures and meets Ouspensky and his associates.
|
| 1916
| Feb.-Aug. |
Period
of concentrated activity: increasingly centred on Petrograd, G.
conveys virtually his entire 'System' of ideas to a group which expands
from six (incl. Stjoernval, Ourspensky, and Andrei Zaharoff) to thirty.
|
|
| Aug. |
On a visit to Finland, G. promotes in Ouspensky an intense telepathic experience.
|
|
| c. Dec. 16 |
In Petrograd G. accepts as pupil the composer, Thomas de Hartmann (and in Feb. 1917 his wife Olga).
|
| 1917
| Feb. 23 |
Parting
from his pupils, a 'transfigured' G. finally leaves Petrograd, setting
out via Moscow for Alexandropol with Julia Ostrowska.
|
|
| Mar. 16 |
Revolution: forced abdication of Tsar Nicholas II; formation of Kerensky government.
|
|
| Mar.-Jun. |
G. lives in retirement with his family in Alexandropol.
|
|
| Jul. (early) |
G. sets out for Petrograd but on reconsideration settles in Essentuki in Caucasus.
|
|
| Jul.-Aug. |
With
thirteen pupils summoned from Moscow and Petrograd (incl. Ouspensky and
Zaharoff), G. undertakes six weeks' intensive psycho-somatic
experimentation at Essentuki.
|
|
| Aug. (end) |
The de Hartmanns join G. at Essentuki. Ouspensky's trust in G. begins to waver. G. moves to Tuapse on Back Sea Coast.
|
|
| Aug.-Dec. |
G.
and his nucleus (augmented in Oct. by Dr and Mme Stjoernval) wander up
and down Black Sea coast to avoid embroilment in Civil War. 7 Nov. (OS
26 Oct.) Bolshevik revolution brings Lenin to power.
|
| 1918
| spring |
G.
returns to Essentuki (Jan.). Perceiving Alexandropol as under Turkish
threat, G. invites his family to join him (all comply except his father
and eldest sister); he summons his pupils (12 Feb.) and begins intensive
work. Ouspensky separates from G. (Mar.).
|
|
| Jul. (mid) |
G.'s eldest sister and her family
reach him in Essentuki as refugees, bringing news that Turks have shot
his father in Alexandropol on 15 May. |
|
| Jul. (late) |
As Essentuki becomes increasingly
threatened by Civil War, G. plants a fabricated newspaper story of his
forthcoming 'scientific expedition' to Mount Induc. |
|
| Aug. 6 |
Posing as a scientist, G. leaves
Essentuki with a following of fourteen (which does not include G.'s
family or Ouspensky). They go by train to Maikop where hostilities
detain them three weeks. |
|
| Aug.-Sept. |
Crossing Red and White lines five
times, G. leads his party on foot over northern Caucasus range to Black
Sea port of Sochi (where many pupils, incl. Zaharoff, leave him). |
| 1919
| Jan. (mid) |
G., with his residual nucleus (Mme Ostrowska, the Stjoernvals, and the de
Hartmanns), voyages south from Sochi to Poti, They entrain for the Georgian capital Tbilisi, where they settle. |
|
| spring |
G. meets and accepts as pupils the
artist Alexandre Salzmann and his wife Jeanne (Easter). Prompted by
the arrival in Tbilisi of his brother Dmitri, G. sends Olga de Harmann
(early May) on a return trip to Essentuki to retrieve possessions and
carry messages. |
|
| summer |
In collaboration with Jeanne
Salzmann, G. gives first public demonstration of his Sacred Dances
(Movements in Tbilisi Opera House (22 Jun.). He summers in Borjom
(Jul.-Aug.). |
|
| autumn |
Having returned to Tbilisi, G.
constitutes (mid-Sept.) his Institute for the Harmonious Development of
Man (founder members: Dr Leonid Stjoernval, Thomas and Olga de
Hartmann, Alexandre and Jeanne Salzmann, and ? Julia Ostrowska). |
|
| winter |
G. continues to teach his 'System'
under the auspices of the Georgian Menshevik social democratic
republic. After accepting Elizabeta Galumnian and Olga Hinzenberg
('Olgivanna') as pupils, G. begins intensive work on The Struggle of the Magicians. |
| 1920
| spring |
Marked deterioration in socio-political conditions in Georgia, and in viability of G.'s Institute. He accepts as pupil Major Frank Pinder (Mar.). |
|
| May (late)
|
G. leads a party of thirty pupils
on foot from Tbilisi to Black Sea port of Batoum, where they embark for
Constantinople (Istanbul). |
|
| Jun. |
G. settles in Constantinople (7
Jun.) and rents an apartment in Koumbaradji Street in Péra. Ouspensky
(in Constantinople since Feb.) confides his own group of pupils to G. |
|
| Jun.-Aug. |
With Ouspensky and Thomas de Hartmann respectively, G. works on the scenario and music of The Struggle of the Magicians; they study the ceremony of the Mevlevi dervishes. |
|
| Sept. |
G. rents substantial accommodation at 13 Abdullatif Yemeneci Sokak near the Galata Tower. |
|
| |
(Back
to top of page)
|
|
| Oct. |
G. re-animates his Institute,
giving public lectures and semi-public rehearsals of the Sacred Dances.
(Ouspensky disassociates himself and withdraws to Prinkipo.) |
|
| Nov. (mid) |
G. learns that his sister Anna
Anastasieff and all her children (excepting her son Valentin) have just
been massacred by Turks at Baytar. |
|
| Dec. |
Thanks to Alexandre Salzmann, G.
receives a letter from Jacques-Dalcroze in Geneva, inviting him to
settle at Hellerau near Dresden. G. accepts and applies for visas. |
| 1921
| Jan. (early) |
G. renews contact with the Sultan's nephew, Prince Mehmet Sabaheddin, and briefly meets Capt. J.G. Bennett. |
|
| May (mid) |
Following several months of declining public interest, G. closes his Institute and retires to the island of Prinkipo. |
|
| Aug. |
On receipt of visas, G. with his
nucleus travels by train from Turkey to Germany; departs Constantinople
(13th); arrives Sofia, Bulgaria (15th); arrives Belgrade, Serbia (16th);
arrives Budapest, Hungary (17th) and departs (21st); transits
Czechoslovakia and arrives Berlin (22nd). (Around this time, Ouspensky
leaves Constantinople for London but his wife Sophie chooses to
accompany G.) |
|
| Sept. |
Having settled in the suburb on Schmargendorf, G. adopts Olga de H. as his private secretary. |
|
| Nov. 24 |
In Berlin G. gives his inaugural lecture in Europe. |
|
| winter |
Accompanied by the Salzmanns, G.
visits the Dalcroze Institute at Hellerau, and through Harald Dohrn
seeks part possession; a legal case ensues. |
| 1922
| Feb. 13 |
G. pays his first brief visit to
London, capturing the allegiance of Ouspensky's many prominent pupils,
notably the editor A. R. Orage. |
|
| Mar. 15 |
On G.'s second and last visit to
London, he confirms his ascendancy and clashes with Ouspensky. While
influential pupils seek UK residential status for G., he returns to
Berlin. |
|
| Late spring |
G. issues his third prospectus in English, German, and French. |
|
| Jun. |
G. loses civil action to acquire Hellerau possession, and is effectively barred from settling in Britain. |
|
| Jul. 14 |
G. brings his pupils from Germany
to Paris, hires facilities at the Dalcroze Institute, and delegates Olga
de H. to seek a large property. |
|
| Oct. 1 |
On the basis of generous financial
help from England, G. acquires and moves to his most famous seat: the
Prieuré des Basses Loges at Fontainebleau-Avon. |
|
| Oct. |
G. is simultaneously occupied with
Prieuré administration and Parisian business ventures. On 17 Oct. he
accepts as a permanent Prieuré guest the terminally ill new Zealand
authoress Katherine Mansfield. |
|
| Nov. |
G. begins intense work on the
Sacred Dances. At end of Nov. he institutes the building of a large
Study House in the Prieuré grounds. |
|
| Dec. 16 |
G. averts a major fire at the Prieuré. |
| 1923
| Jan. |
G. acquires notoriety after Katherine Mansfield dies (9th) and is buried on the same day (12th) that the Study House is opened. |
|
| Feb. |
Reporters (notably E. C. Bowyer)
and academics (notably Prof. Denis Saurat) interview G. at the Prieuré
and produce popular but not unsympathetic accounts. |
|
| May |
G. learns to drive. At his new Paris apartment, 9 Rue du Commandant-Marchand, he entertains Ezra Pound. |
|
| summer |
G.'s 'open evenings' of his music,
Sacred Dances, etc., given in the Prieuré Study House, are regularly
attended by local dignitaries and occasionally by cultural figures, e.g.
Diaghilev and Sinclair Lewis. |
|
| Dec. |
Although fatigued, G. produces his
first major public demonstration of Sacred Dances in Europe. Premièred
(16th) at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, it has a mixed reception. G.
extricates his mother and sister from Russia and domiciles them at the
Prieuré. |
| 1924
| spring |
With c. thirty-five pupil-dancers, G. sails (4 Jan.) on the s.s. Paris for
America, where public demonstrations in New York (Jan.-Feb.) and
Philadelphia, Boston, and Chicago (Mar.) secure the interest of
significant new pupils (notably Margaret Anderson, Muriel Draper, Jane
Heap, Gorham Munson, C. S. Nott, and Jean Toomer). G. founds New York
branch of his Institute (8 Apr.). |
|
| summer |
G. returns to France (Jun.). He
loses occupancy of Commandant-Marchand and acquires a new apartment at
47 Boulevard Peréire. Driving alone from Paris to Fontainebleau, G. has
a near fatal motor-car crash (8 Jul.). Nursed by his wife and mother,
he makes a slow and painful recovery-against medical expectation. Still
convalescent, G. formally 'disbands' his Institute (26 Aug.) but in
fact disperses only his less dedicated pupils. |
|
| autumn- winter |
G. empowers Orage to supervise the
Work in America (Oct.). Having resolved in future to propagate his
ideas by writing, G. commences (16 Dec.) his magnum opus: Beelzebub. |
| 1925
| Mar. |
Orage's report that the first installment of Beelzebub in unintelligible, heralds G.'s long stylistic struggle. |
|
| summer |
G.'s mother dies of chronic liver
disease at the Prieuré (end Jun.). G. begins intensive period of musical
composition with Thomas de Hartmann (29 Jul.). |
|
| winter |
G.'s wife Mme Ostrowska contracts
cancer. Neither orthodox radiotherapy nor G.'s unorthodox treatment
gives satisfactory results. |
| 1926
| Jan. 8 |
Mabel Dodge Luhan offers G. substantial property at Taos, New Mexico, but (1 Feb.) he declines. |
|
| Feb.-Jun. |
G. struggles intensely but unavailingly for Julia Ostrowska's life but she dies (26 Jun.). Ouspensky attends her funeral. |
|
| Jul. |
Aleister Crowley briefly visits Prieuré and G. emphatically repudiates him. |
| 1927
| spring
|
Short of money, G. is obliged to
relinquish his flat in Boulevard Péreire (16 Apr.). G. culminates his
musical collaboration with Thomas de Hartmann (1 May). |
|
| summer |
Many American pupils and
voyeurists visit Prieuré. G. meets, but fails to impress, his future
secretary Solita Solano. He repudiates the poet Waldo Frank. |
|
| autumn |
Convinced by a serious decline in health that he has insufficient time to undertake a necessary and radical revision of Beelzebub he undergoes a crisis (6 Nov.) and contemplates suicide. |
| 1928
| Jan. (mid) |
A. R. Orage, accompanied by his young bride Jessie, makes a brief, stormy, and final visit to the Prieuré. |
|
| May 5 |
To stimulate his writing G. vows to 'banish' on various pretexts all those who make his life too comfortable. |
|
| summer (early) |
G. encourages senior pupils away
on extended visits: Mme Ouspensky to England, and the Salzmanns to
Frankfurt. He discourages Jane Heap from settling at the Prieuré, but
mandates her to start an 'artists' group' in Montmartre. |
|
| summer (late) |
Alexandre Salzmann defends G. against ideological attacks of French occultist René Guénon. |
|
| autumn |
Provisionally satisfied with Beelzebub, G. commences his second book Meetings. |
| 1929
| Jan. |
Accompanied only by the de Hartmanns, G. embarks on s.s Paris for his second visit to America. They resist his promptings to make independent lives. |
|
| spring |
Between arrival in New York (23 Jan.) and departure for France (5 Apr.) G. renews contacts with pupils and amasses funds. |
|
| summer (early)
|
G. again prompts Mme Ouspensky to
visit England. He finally prevails on the de Hartmanns to leave the
Prieuré and helps them settle in Courbevoie. He appoints Louise
Goepfert as his secretary (Jun.). |
|
| autumn |
G. facilitates the departure of
Fritz Peters from the Prieuré (Sept.). On visits to Frankfurt and
Berlin with Louise Goepfert and Olga de Hartmann, G. intentionally
alienates Olga. The Wall Street stock market crash (Oct. ) affects G.'s American followers. |
|
| |
(Back
to top of page)
|
| 1930
| spring |
After burning all his personal
papers, and engineering a painful and final parting from Olga de
Hartmann, G. sails (Feb.) aboard s.s. Bremen on his third trip
to America. In New York he intentionally creates difficulties,
sabotaging negotiations with Alfred Knopf to publish Beelzebub. He sails for France (Apr.) leaving Orage disillusioned. |
|
| autumn (late) |
In Paris Alexandre Salzmann attracts René Daumal (subsequently G.'s first French pupil). |
|
| winter |
On a fourth trip to America, G.
effectively breaks with Orage. Arriving in New York (13 Nov.), he
demands (1 Dec.) of Orage's pupils that they repudiate their teacher.
Orage himself returns (10 Dec.) from holiday in England and surprisingly
endorses G.'s action, repudiating himself. G. leaves for Chicago (29
Dec.). |
| 1931
| Jan. |
Returning to New York, G. has an inconclusive encounter with certain intellectuals, including John Watson, the behaviourist. |
|
| Mar. 13 |
After a final parting from Orage, G. sails for France, leaving the American groups in disarray. |
|
| spring |
G. briefly receives Thornton Wilder at the Prieuré.
|
|
| summer |
G. refuses Ouspensky access to the
Prieuré, creating a final breach. Mme Ouspensky leaves Asnières and
moves permanently to England. |
|
| autumn |
G. is involved in a theatrical incident with a revolver. |
|
| winter |
G. sails (Nov.) on fifth, brief
visit to the USA, focusing on Jean Toomer's Chicago group. In New York
the author-adventurer Nadir Khan ('Achmed Abdullah') mistakes G. for the
Lama Agwhan Dordjieff. |
| 1932
| Jan. 16 |
G. sails for Cherbourg on the s.s. Bremen. |
|
| Feb. |
In Paris G. is approached by the
American lesbian authoress, Kathryn Hulme, a member of Jane Heap's
group; he shows her the Prieuré, now run down. |
|
| May 11 |
G. supervises the enforced closure
of the Prieuré and dispersal of its final occupants; he takes a room in
the Grand Hôtel, adjoining the Café de la Paix. |
|
| Aug. |
Orage refuses an opportunity to renew contact with G. |
|
| Sept. 13 |
G. begins drafting his controversial, autobiographical tract Herald. |
|
| winter |
On a disastrous sixth visit to America G. gives an impression of venality, alienating Jean Toomer and his Chicago group. |
| 1933
| Mar. 7 |
G. writes bizarre 'Supplementary Announcement' to Herald. |
|
| Apr. |
Alexandre Salzmann, critically ill, meets G. at the Café Henri IV in Fontainebleau. |
|
| May? |
G. loses the Prieuré irrevocably after the mortgagees foreclose. |
|
| autumn |
G. commences his seventh visit to
the USA. From his apartment at the Henry Hudson Hotel, he renews
contact with New York pupils of Orage. |
| 1934
| spring |
Death of Alexandre Gustav Salzmann
(3 Mar.). G. visits the Chicago groups (May), intentionally alienating
Fritz Peters on the train journey. |
|
| summer |
G. pays an extended visit to
Olgivanna at Taliesin, Wisconsin (Jun.-Jul.), deeply impressing her
husband Frank Lloyd Wright. Mabel Dodge Luhan refuses G.'s request (18
Aug.) for the ranch she originally volunteered in Jan. 1926. Back in
New York (Sept.), G. gives two unfortunate interviews to the popular
writer Rom Landau. |
|
| autumn- winter
|
G. repudiates Herald and
calls in all copies (Oct.). Shocked to learn of Orage's death (5 Nov.),
and wishing to avoid a spate of empty condolences, G. travels to
Washington, Boston, Chicago and certain Southern States. |
| 1935
| Jan. |
G. returns to New York. |
|
| Apr.-May |
Conjectural events attend G.'s completion (9 Apr.) of the Prologue to Life is Real.
He travels to Washington anticipating, from a Senator Bronson Cutting,
generous financial support to repurchase the Prieuré. Profoundly
depressed when Cutting dies (6 May) in an air crash, G. applies
unsuccessfully to return to Russia. Doubly disappointed, he abandons
writing and disappears. |
|
| Jun.-Aug. |
G. makes putative but unsubstantiated journeys to? Germany, Leningrad and Central Asia. |
|
| Sept. |
Rom Landau publishes his bestseller God is My Adventure, vilifying G. and confusing him with Dordjieff. |
|
| Oct. |
G. reappears in Paris. Jane Heap
moves (18th) from Paris to London. Three of her American women pupils
immediately gravitate to G. who constitutes his first Parisian group
(21st) in Hôtel Napoleon Bonaparte. |
|
| Christmas |
G. takes new apartment in Rue Labie near the Salle Pleyel. |
| 1936
| spring |
G. constitutes 'The Rope' (early
Jan.), an exclusively lesbian group meeting in Rue Labie (initially
comprising Elizabeth Gordon, Solita Solano, Kathryn Hulme and 'Wendy'.)
He makes many tours by car to European locales. |
|
| Jun. |
G. gives Georgette Leblanc, Margaret Anderson and Monique entrée to his current work, though not to 'The Rope'. |
|
| Jul. (end) |
Having temporarily suspended group
work with his lesbian pupils, G. makes his first token contact with
René Daumal and Jeanne de Salzmann's Sèrves group. |
|
| Aug. |
Unable to afford a château he has located on the Marne, G. moves to a small Paris apartment at 6 Rue des Colonels Rénard. |
|
| winter |
On reconvening his lesbian group (Oct.), G. finds Georgette Leblanc seriously ill, but he alleviates her condition. |
| 1937
| spring |
G. resumes extensive car trips. His brother Dmitri contracts cancer. |
|
| Aug. |
Dmitri dies, despite G.'s effort to help him. |
|
| autumn |
'The Rope' and subsidiary lesbian
groupings effectively dissolve (as Kathryn Hulme and Wendy settle in
America, and Anderson and Leblanc in Normandy). Solita Solano becomes
G.'s secretary. |
| 1938
| |
Dr Leonid Stjoernval dies near
Reims. (Apr.). As Jeanne de Salzmann adds the author Luc Dietrich to
her existing circle of pupils (René and Vera Daumal, Philippe Lavastine,
Henri and Henriette Tracol, etc.), G. implicitly confirms her as his
deputy. |
| 1939
| spring |
Accompanied by Solita Solano, G. sails (Mar.) on s.s. Paris on his brief penultimate trip to America. The international crisis steadily worsens. Having resisted pressure to settle in New Jersey, G. sails (19 May) on s.s. Normandie for France. |
|
| summer |
G. contemplates trip to England to assist Mme Ouspensky medically, but Ouspensky disapproves and the plan is dropped. |
|
| autumn |
Outbreak (1 Sept.) of the Second World War. G. remains in Paris (throughout War) at 6 Rue des Colonels Rénard, which he stocks with provisions. |
| 1940
| spring |
Jeanne de Salzmann's group,
meeting at 54 Rue du Four, grows in size and influence. G. consolidates
his contact with Philippe Lavastine and René Daumal. |
|
| Jun. |
With Allied resistance collapsing, G.'s followers attempt (12th) to relocate him in the countryside but he returns to 6 Rue des Colonels Rénard (14th) just as Germans occupy Paris. |
|
| winter |
Food being scarce and the weather
exceptionally harsh, G. begins helping an extended family of needy
neighbors. Jeanne de Salzmann formally presents her French group to G.
(Oct.). |
| 1941
| |
G.'s French group meeting at 6 Rue des Colonels Rénard enlarges. Hitler's
invasion of Russia (22 Jun.) and America's declaration of war on
Germany (11 Dec.) predicate the ultimate liberation of Paris. Georgette Leblanc dies (20 Oct.) of cancer. |
| 1942
| spring |
To obtain further credit, G. fabricates story that he has been give a Texas oil-well. |
|
| May 29 |
G. advises his Jewish pupils to 'go underground' when the Germans oblige them to wear the yellow Star of David. They are harboured by Christian group members. |
|
| Jun. (late) |
Jeanne de Salzmann presents Luc Dietrich to G. |
|
| Jul.16-17 |
G.'s advice is vindicated as Parisian Jews are deported in 'Operation spring Wind'. René and Vera Daumal no longer have access to G. |
|
| Nov. |
Germans overrun France's Unoccupied Zone. |
| 1943
| |
Further influx of French pupils.
G. active in teaching enneagram-based Movements at the Salle Pleyel and
developing his ritual 'Toasts to the Idiots'. |
| 1944
| |
Death of René Daumal (21 May) and Luc Dietrich (12 Aug.) precedes liberation of Paris (25 Aug.). In autumn G. is arrested for currency offences but discharged. |
| 1945
| |
Hitler's suicide (30 Apr.) and VE Day (6 May).
G. receives first visits of American pupils (Kathryn Hulme and Fritz
Peters). He attracts unwarranted criticism over the death of
Irène-Carole Reweliotty (11 Aug.) Japan's surrender (14 Aug.) ends war. Lise Tracol becomes G.'s residential housekeeper. |
| 1946
| |
G.'s relationship with Katherine Mansfield is pilloried in the magazines l'Illustration (19 Jan.). First influx of London pupils to Paris from Jane Heap's group. |
| 1947
| |
Ouspensky returns to England
(Jan.) from America. G. invites him to Paris but Ouspensky declines.
When Ouspensky dies (2 Oct.) Mme Ouspensky, still at Mendham, makes
overtures to G. |
| 1948
| Jan. |
Mme Ouspensky advises her husband's British followers at Lyne to contact G. |
|
| summer |
G. summons Ouspensky's pupils
(Jun.) but they still vacillate. He reintegrates J. G. Bennett in his
work (after twenty-five years) and cures his wife Winifred (Aug.). G.
recovers astonishingly after serious injury in a car crash (8 Aug.) and
promptly issues a general invitation to Paris: pupils of Jane Heap,
Ouspensky, Mme Ouspensky, Orage, Bennett (but not Nicoll) commingle with
French. |
|
| winter |
Eager to buy the Château de Voisins and to publish Beelzebub, G. sails for New York (arr. 17 Dec.). Here he raises funds and authorizes Mme Ouspensky to publish Fragments. |
| 1949
| spring |
Announcing Beelzebub's imminent
publication, G. nominates three literary executors (J. G. Bennett, Lord
Pentland, and René Zuber). He sails for France (Feb.) in Queen Mary with large entourage (including Iovanna Lloyd Wright). |
|
| summer |
G. makes car expeditions to Vichy
(Jun.); Geneva (Jul.) to meet Mme Stjoernval; and finally Montignac
(Aug.) to see the Lascaux cave paintings. His ideas are favourably
mentioned on Italian radio in connection with the Montessori system. |
|
| Sept. |
G. announces he will sail for New York on 20 Oct.; he buys La Grand Paroisse, ostensibly as a new centre. |
|
| Oct. |
Under intense pressures G.'s
health fails. Having choreographed (No. 39) his last Movement (11th),
he collapses at Movements class (14th). Nursed by Lise Tracol and
surrounded by doctors, his condition fluctuates. Receipt of Beelzebub's proofs
(21st) suggests the apotheosis of his life's work. Seriously ill, he
supervises the Toasts to the Idiots for the last time (24th). He is
taken by ambulance to the American Hospital at Neuilly (26th), where Dr
Welch performs an abdominal puncture. G. gives his final instructions
to Jeanne de Salzmann (27th), becomes unconscious (28th), and dies
around 10.30am (29th). Religious services are held on successive days. |
|
| Nov.3 |
G. is buried in the family plot at
Fontainebleau-Avon. Under the leadership of Jeanne de Salzmann, his
groups re-dedicate themselves to practise and transmit his ideas. |
