“The Struggle of the Magicians”: Hardcover edition

I am pleased to report that Book Studio has reissued The Struggle of the Magicians: Scenario of the Ballet (see below for details). I have written a fair amount on the scenario’s significance. To briefly restate my thesis: it seems to me that Gurdjieff had intended that the ballet be the centre of the form he would give his Fourth Way School. As Ouspensky recalls in In Search of the Miraculous:

The fourth way is never without some work of a definite significance, is never without some undertaking around which and in connection with which it can alone exist. When this work is finished, that is to say, when the aim set before it has been accomplished, the fourth way disappears, that is, it disappears from the given place, disappears in its given form, continuing perhaps in another place in another form. (312)

If I am correct in this, then the scenario is of prime importance. At our first residential here, we studied the Struggle over three days, and much swam into focus for us, much was offered for our engagement, so to speak. To put it in a nutshell, I would say that the scenario displays patterns which show us, more effectively than words, the critical need to actualise the Law of Three within ourselves, and how to do so. It does so not only in theory but also offers, or at least indicates the nature of, practical methods.  A certain amount of music written for it survives, and it is thought that Gurdjieff created for this scenario some of the early Movements (e.g. the Great Prayer) and the latter (Numbers 25a and b, but also Forty Positions = Hymn to the Sun).

What I think is unique about the ballet, is how it is neither simply a text nor simply a Movement (I am not using “simply” as a substitute for “merely.”) It places the Movements in context, and by presenting a narrative with a core pattern at its heart, it shows rather than explains, it animates rather than attempts to convince.

Unfortunately, even tragically, Gurdjieff’s immediate plans were cut short by financial problems (which were not helped by the often fitful responses of audiences) and then the major car accident of 1924 as he was returning the Fontainebleau. Yet, he never seems to have quite abandoned the ballet. He created Movement number 25 of 39, “White Magic/ Black Magic” in his final years, and taught more directly some of the methods which were hinted at in the scenario. I almost tremble to imagine what it might have been to have been one of Gurdjieff’s  students when he was working on the pieces of this ballet.

But perhaps the most important sign of the ongoing value of the Struggle for Gurdjieff, and its corner-stone position in his system, is how on 21 August 1943, he had the scenario, or an extract from it, read to his pupils before their group meeting. Then, in the meeting itself, he seems to indicate that the scenario is also “a treatise on education” (p.64 of the 2024 edition of Transcripts of Gurdjieff’s Wartime Meetings 1941-46). Perhaps significantly, at this meeting they were discussing the effects of the “separation” exercise, and Gurdjieff’s comments about sensing the separate reality of “I”, and on the concomitant growth of “good” and “bad” may have related back to the scenario. This is an interesting way to read that transcript.

So I believe that the scenario is of fundamental importance for Gurdjieff’s system. It was indeed published in 1957, in a private edition, by the Stourton Press in Cape Town, and circulated in photocopies. Then it was republished in a paperback in 2014. Although the edition was marred by a pointless “smoothing” of the English which I would have spoken against for two reasons: first, a text by Gurdjieff and Ouspensky should be altered only for pressing reasons, none of which obtained here; and second, the actual revision has the whiff of “bon ton” about it. But in its favour, the Struggle was now available in an affordable edition, easy to read and handle, the style of cover, with flaps, was very nicely done, and the cover illustrations by Nonny Hogrogian were very good.

But that edition is out of print, and now Book Studio have issued what may prove to be the definitive edition. It is a hardcover, so it will be more expensive, but the paper is first quality, and it will outlast me. As a significant bonus, there is the artwork of Alexandre de Salzmann, produced for the ballet. This is found on the covers and in four internal full colour illustrations. It seems to me that great care has been taken to ensure that the colour is well reproduced.

Together with the excellent presentation, this edition restores the original text: no revisions, no “helpful” adverbs to prompt the reader or “guide” his imagination. This is the unvarnished article. And that is what we want. I recommend this edition to all students of Gurdjieff.

In Australia, it is only available via Kindle. https://www.amazon.com.au/s?k=The+Struggle+of+the+Magicians%3A+Scenario+of+the+Ballet&crid=GLJU063M0P2A&sprefix=the+struggle+of+the+magicians+scenario+of+the+ballet%2Caps%2C244&ref=nb_sb_noss

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