Views from the Real World: Early Talks of G.I. Gurdjieff

A collection of early talks by G.I. Gurdjieff, recollected from memory by his pupils, delivered in Moscow, Essentuki, Tiflis, Berlin, London, Paris, New York, and Chicago in the years surrounding the Russian Revolution and his establishment of the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man at the Chateau du Prieuré near Paris. The talks offer an authentic record of Gurdjieff's direct approach to inner work — addressing the evolution of consciousness, the necessity of self-study, and the conditions required for genuine inner transformation. The collection is introduced with a foreword by Jeanne de Salzmann, who spent thirty years with Gurdjieff and carried the responsibility for his groups in his final decade. She emphasizes that his teaching was never fixed in form — methods changed as understanding deepened — and that transformation requires not intellectual grasp alone but the full engagement of feeling and body. Also included is "Glimpses of Truth," a 1914 account of a conversation with Gurdjieff by a Moscow pupil, and a selection of the aphorisms inscribed at the Prieuré.