Gurdjieff International Review

Gurdjieff’s Theory of Art

by Dr. Anna Challenger

“We gave advice in its proper place,
Spending a lifetime in the task.
If it should not touch anyone’s ear of desire,
The messenger told his tale, it is enough.”

Muslih-uddin Sa’di
13^th c. Sufi poet
The Rose Garden

Because literature for Gurdjieff, as for the Sufis, is inextricable from philosophy, it is appropriate in considering Beelzebub’s Tales to address some fundamental philosophical questions, the answers to which help put Gurdjieff’s writings into perspective. Among the issues to be addressed, one of primary importance is to define what constitutes literature for Gurdjieff, or what, according to his aesthetics, distinguishes literature from non-literature; art from non-art.…

[The complete text is available in the printed copy of this issue.]