Jeanne de Salzmann
The Sui Generis Pupil of Mr. Gurdjieff
The de Salzmanns first met Gurdjieff in Tiflis, Georgia during the time of Easter 1919. It had been only eight months before in August 1918, that Gurdjieff had masterfully navigated the journey through the Caucasus Mountains taking a nucleus of seventeen pupils out of Russia through a civil war and its inevitable phenomenon of mass psychosis. Among the pupils were composer and pianist Thomas de Hartmann and his wife Olga, an opera singer, both 33 years old. Of that time, crossing five times between Bolshevik and White Army lines, Gurdjieff said, “miracles were being performed for us…. I and my companions moved under supernatural protection.”
Contemplating such a journey, one is moved in the recognition of the inner demand within which pupils had to work under the guiding gaze and Being of Gurdjieff as well as the lawful force inevitably created through their efforts. Of that time, Gurdjieff said “…instinctively sensing in my activities the living germ of that sacred impulse which alone is capable of bringing genuine happiness to humanity, they furthered in whatever way they could the process of accomplishment of that which I had undertaken long before the war.”
What was it like for the de Salzmanns to be introduced to the de Hartmanns through their mutual friend and composer, Nikolai Tcherepnin, when Gurdjieff’s band of pupils finally arrive in Tiflis in February 1919? Madame de Salzmann was born on January 26, 1889 in Reims, France, and raised in Geneva, Switzerland. At the time of their meeting she was 30 years old and had graduated from the Conservatory of Geneva having studied conducting, composition and piano. By 1919 she had opened a school of dance and music in Tiflis based on the methods of Émile Jaques-Dalcroze, under whom she had also studied. Alexander de Salzmann, 45 years old at the time, was born in Tiflis, had graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and was then painting the scenery commissioned by Tcherepnin for an opera. From the point of view of the arts, music, and dance—what a combination of talent and artistic ability among this newly formed group of friends. But from the point of view of being, the de Salzmanns inevitably must have felt something in meeting the de Hartmanns—“the living germ of that sacred impulse”—such that the de Hartmanns soon asked Gurdjieff if they could bring the de Salzmanns to meet him.
It is Easter, late April 1919, when the de Salzmanns are presented to Gurdjieff, and the symbolism cannot be lost. Of them Gurdjieff says, “He is a very fine man, and she—is intelligent.” And of the impact of her first meeting Madame de Salzmann says, “The first impression of Gurdjieff was very strong, unforgettable. He had an expression I had never seen, and an intelligence, a force, that was different…a vision that could see everything.” And barely two months later in June 1919 she is already instrumental in staging the very first demonstration of Gurdjieff’s Sacred Dances. Can we stop a moment—and take this in? The being and force of this young 30-year-old, the readiness, the intelligencecapable of helping to stage the Sacred Dance demonstrations, herself having just entered Gurdjieff’s sphere six to eight weeks earlier? Such is the beginning force, the Do, of Madame de Salzmann’s meeting with this ancient teaching and the Master who embodies it—Gurdjieff.
Seeing that establishing his Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man would not materialize in Tiflis, Gurdjieff goes in search of another land where it would be possible. In the spring of 1920, the de Salzmanns and one-year old daughter Nathalie, along with a core of pupils follow Gurdjieff to Constantinople, then to Germany, London and finally to France where in November 1922 he arranges the purchase of le Prieurédes Basses Loges, situated in the small town of Avon,where Gurdjieff finally succeeds in establishing the Institute. Aptly calling to mind the Easter motif underlying Madame de Salzmann’s first meeting with Gurdjieff, he describes the newly founded Institute as, “A hatching place for eggs. It supplies the heat. Chickens inside must try to break their shells, then help and individual teaching is possible. Until then only collective method.”
At the Prieuré both de Salzmanns are named among Gurdjieff’s list of “Responsible Members of the Institute”—de Salzmann in the “Capacity of Instructor” and she, “Assistant Instructor.” Archival records show Madame de Salzmann photographed as a principal dancer performing the Sacred Dances in her early years; specific accounts in the extant literature by fellow pupils regarding her role in assisting Sacred Dances during this early period have not been found. Nevertheless, with her music and dance training, her experience in running a dance school in Tiflis, as well as having been named Assistant Instructor for the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man, Madame de Salzmann is undoubtedly instrumental in preparing pupils for Gurdjieff’s demonstrations of Sacred Dances.
In December 1923, the pupils give five demonstrations at the Theâtre des Champs-Elysées, Paris. Additionally, although Madame de Salzmann herself is likely not among the travelers having given birth to Michel de Salzmann on December 31, 1923, she likely has helped to prepare a troupe of twenty-two pupils for their voyage to America departing January 5, 1924. The group arrives in New York on January 13, 1924, for their five-month stay, with all the prior work under Madame de Salzmann coming to fruition. The demonstrations of Sacred Dances are given at Manhattan’s Leslie Hall, the Neighborhood Playhouse, and Carnegie Hall, as well as in Boston and Chicago. Truly a tour de force by Madame de Salzmann and the pupils she was entrusted with to assist.
Unexpectedly, Gurdjieff suffers an auto crash in July 1924. With all the difficulties it created for him personally and the aborted consequence for his aim to create a cadre of what he called Helper-Instructors, Gurdjieff comes to see that he would need to create a written Legominism—a Scripture—to hurl his teaching into the future. Thus, just a few months following the auto crash, he begins to write the first book of his three-part Legominism, ALL and Everything, First Series, “An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man” or, “Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson”—infusing the text with a conscious influence, creating a vehicle of transmission. But four years later, in order to accomplish the rewrite of Beelzebub’s Tales and two other “will-tasks,” he decides “to remove from my eyesight all those who by this or that make my life too comfortable.” So, 9 years after their initial meeting, in May 1928 he sends Madame de Salzmann and her husband to Frankfurt, Germany. The following year, 1929, Madame de Salzmann returns to the Prieuré and works on translating into French the English text of Beelzebub’s Tales which has been worked on by A.R. Orage under Gurdjieff’s direction. Then in May 1932 Gurdjieff officially closes the Prieuré, selling it the following year.
It is likely that during this time the de Salzmanns would be living in Paris since de Salzmann is working there as an interior designer and later an antique dealer. This is the time when René Daumal, the avant-garde poet and writer, meets de Salzmann. Daumal, who sees de Salzmann as “an incredible man,” urges him to impart what he knows and so de Salzmann forms a group. Although it is nowhere indicated, it seems likely that Madame de Salzmann would have assisted him.
Upon de Salzmann’s death in March 1934, Madame de Salzmann does assume responsibility for the group and introduces its members to Gurdjieff in July 1936. The group includes, in addition to Daumal, Vera Milanova, Henri Tracol, Henriette Lannes, Philippe Lavastine, Nathalie de Salzmann, and Luc Dietrich. By 1939 her French group now included Pauline de Dampierre, Marthe de Gaigneron, Bernard Lemaître, and Solange Claustres.
In 1940 the Nazis have occupied Paris and Gurdjieff insists on staying. That October Madame de Salzmann presents her expanded French group—allstrong and serious pupils whose efforts would later be instrumental for the dissemination of the teaching. It didn’t matter that Germans were patrolling the streets, the weekly meetings, readings of Beelzebub’s Tales, and Sacred Dances were being held with his closest pupil, Madame de Salzmann, as his assistant.
A few years after the war in June 1948, Margaret Anderson, along with Dorothy Caruso, visited Gurdjieff at 6 rue des Colonels Renard. She gives this account:
Nine years and a war brought new people to the remembered table, but the quest was the old quest, the same as ours. The pictures on the walls were new, but they had the same quality as the old ones—“everything but art,” as Jane said long ago.…
…There were now so many new pupils—English and American and French—that he transmitted much of his instruction through a person we had known in the old Prieuré days. After years of work with him her stature was now visible to everyone. Her name was Jeanne de Salzmann.
The Dervish Prayer, front left to right, Olgivanna Hinzenberg, Elizaveta Galumnian, Jeanne de Salzmann. Soon after Gurdjieff arrives in New York in January 1924, the troupe of pupils Jeanne de Salzmann helped to prepare gave public demonstrations of his Sacred Dances first at Leslie Hall, followed by the Neighborhood Playhouse and Carnegie Hall.
On October 29, 1949, the inevitable happened. Mr. Gurdjieff passed on to Higher Realms leaving behind a sacred teaching, literally embodied in all who heard his call and Worked to Be. Now it was up to this first generation of pupils to doconsciously with what they had, with what was theirs. But Gurdjieff, ever the Seer—safeguarding his teaching for future generations—left for us a whole body of consciously imbued material, his Legominism: initiatory texts, sacred dances and sacred music. His Legominism embodies the force of a conscious influence, as the holy spaceship tenderly carrying through time and space this seminal teaching as he intended it—helping to effectuate the necessary vibratory transformation for our spiritual awakening.
Now, his closest pupil, Madame de Salzmann—the only one who had actively assisted Gurdjieff in meetings during his final decade—was entrusted by Gurdjieff, on his deathbed, to create a “responsible nucleus” of people and to publish Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson, as his directives to carry the teaching forward. And so, in February 1950 the galley proofs Gurdjieff had held in his hands on October 21, 1949, eight days before he died, the text which he had supervised, fully vetted and authorized, was published in America and England.
Over the next 40 years until her death on May 25, 1990, at the age of 101, Madame de Salzmann dedicated her life to establish and oversee centers around the world to help spread Gurdjieff’s teaching, starting in 1955 with the Institut Gurdjieff in Paris; The Gurdjieff Society, London, led by Henrietta Lannes; The Gurdjieff Foundation of New York led by Lord Pentland; and G.I. Gurdjieff Foundation, Caracas, Venezuela, led by her daughter Nathalie de Etievan, who also helped to establish other Gurdjieff Foundations throughout South America, as well as developing the Etievan Method, an educational model for children based on G.I. Gurdjieff ’s teaching. After Madame de Salzmann’s death, her son, Michel de Salzmann, assumed the responsibility she had carried until his own death in 2001 at the age of 77.
Madame de Salzman, Mr. Gurdjieff and students study a map as they plan one of many driving excursions in the 1940s after the war’s end.
The Unanswered Question
Nearly one year before his passing, in November 1948, Gurdjieff sailed to America, accompanied by Madame de Salzmann and Lord Pentland. It is here in New York that Gurdjieff announces his decision to publish the English text of the First Series of All and Everything—Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson.
And so, on January 13, 1949, during lunch, in Gurdjieff ’s rooms at the Hotel Wellington, the space jammed with students, Gurdjieff has J.G. Bennett read the circular letter. “Read, read—is for everybody,” he tells Bennett :
This circular is addressed to all my present and former adepts and to all who have been directly or indirectly influenced by my ideas and have sensed and understood that they contain something which is necessary for the food of humanity. After fifty years of preparation and having overcome the greatest difficulties and obstacles, I have decided to publish the first series of my writings under the title of “An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man,” or “Beelzebub’s Tales to his Grandson.” By this publication I shall begin to actualize the plans I have prepared for the transmission of my ideas to the whole of contemporary and future humanity.
Gurdjieff returns to Paris in February 1949, and eight months later on October 21, just eight days before his passing, the galley proofs of the authoritative English text of Beelzebub’s Tales arrive for him to see and approve. Those galley proofs represent his countless indefatigable efforts of great sacrifice to write, rewrite, listen to readings aloud, wait for new typescripts, again meetings at night to listen again to what he has changed, adjusted, perfected—and continues perfecting as he listens. For 25 years Gurdjieff—the Master Philologist & Etymologist—perfected the English text. Why the need to have it read night after night until 2 or 3 in the morning listening to what he wrote, seemingly endless times? What was he listening for? Why did he keep refining, changing this word, that word, changing the commas, creating neologisms, hyphenating phrases, adjusting the word-vibrations and listening for the effect on the reader and listener, on all three brains?? . . . Yes, why so much care? Why did it take 25 years for him to come to the self-satisfaction that now, this is exact, it is ready to publish? Why so much love?
Then on October 27, two days before his passing, Madame de Salzmann tells us that Gurdjieff gives her—his closest pupil, to whom he is entrusting his life’s Work for humanity—his final instructions:
Publish as and when you are sure that the time has come. Publish the First and Second Series [of All and Everything]. The essential thing, the first thing, is to prepare a nucleus of people capable of responding to the demand which will arise. So long as there is no responsible nucleus, the action of the ideas will not go beyond a certain threshold. That will take time…a lot of time, even. To publish the Third Series is not necessary. It was written for another purpose. Nevertheless, if you believe you ought to do so one day, publish it. [Underlines added.]
Then in February 1950, four months after Gurdjieff ’s death-of-the-body on October 29, 1949, Madame de Salzmann did see to it that Gurdjieff ’s Magnum Opus—ALL and Everything: “An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of Man” or, beelzebub’s tales to his grandson—authorized and approved by him before he passed, was faithfully published by Harcourt, Brace & Co. in America and by Routledge & Kegan Paul in England, also in 1950. Soon thereafter she completed the French translation based on the authoritative 1950 printing, and published it in 1956.
. . . But then, in 1992—and again in 2006—the institutions entrusted to spread Gurdjieff ’s teaching, authored their own version of Gurdjieff ’s Magnum Opus; the copyright page states, “Originally written in Russian and Armenian. The English translation published in 1950 has been revised by a group of translators under the direction of Jeanne de Salzmann.” The result was not a reproduction of the authoritative 1950 English text as originally published by Harcourt Brace, but an adulteration which is significantly changed in sense and meaning, and with an alarming amount of text deleted representing more than 100 pages. And, Gurdjieff ’s name is being used as its author.
What happened between February 1950 and 1992 that led to the sweeping adulteration of the Legominism so carefully prepared and sacrificed for by Gurdjieff himself for the benefit of Humanity? . . .
This will always remain a mystery because the inner facts can only be known by those whose hand gave it form. What is known is that under the initiative of Madame de Salzmann, after completing and publishing the French edition in 1956, a “translation” team was formed to make changes to Gurdjieff ’s 1949 galley proofs of Beelzebub’s Tales with the intention to make it more . . . palatable for readers. The effect, however, was to put it in “bon ton literary language,” which Gurdjieff detested and had already warned us about. The Editor’s Note in the 2006 printing—based on the 1992 adulterated text—would have the reader believe that passages in the authoritative 1950 text, “were needlessly complex and, for many readers, extremely difficult to read and understand.” Paradoxically, on the same page as well, the Editor admits, “The English version was first published in 1950, just a few months after Gurdjieff died. He had overruled objections that the translation needed more work, insisting that the time had come to launch his ideas into the mainstream of Western thinking.”
The “translation” team included members of various organizations including the Institut Gurdjieff (Paris), The Gurdjieff Foundation (New York), Gurdjieff Society (London), and Triangle Editions, the publication arm for the named organizations. The 1992 book was printed two years after Madame de Salzmann’s death and the Editor’s Note indicates that, “Madame de Salzmann herself worked for a number of years with the editorial team and then left them to complete the project.”
Having begun in the mid-1950s, this means that for over 35 years (approximately1957–1992) the “translation” team of pupils were working sincerely and diligently, dedicating countless hours to—Edit Gurdjieff? Replace the word vibrations he intentionally chose? Rewrite his formulations? Fix his ideas?—How does one express what was being done? Gurdjieff himself warned us about our “strange psyche” in his authoritative English 1950 text of Beelzebub’s Tales:
Little by little they so changed these indications and counsels of His that if their Saintly Author Himself should chance to appear there and for some reason or other should wish to make Himself acquainted with them, He would not be able even to suspect that these indications and counsels were made by Him Himself.
Seven days before his final departure, Gurdjieff said:
It is the beginning of a new world. Either the old world will make me Tchik or I will make the old world Tchik. Then the new world can begin.
The last photo taken of Mr. Gurdjieff. Visiting on 30 June 1948, Margaret Anderson wrote “His weariness with the human condition had reached the breaking-point. But we knew that he would fulfill to the end his obligation to life.”
Gurdjieff is telling us: Either we Work on ourselves and the sacred Teaching he brings awakens us to higher degrees of Being, or, the involutionary processes of waking state consciousness lawfully deviate and distort what has been brought. And yet, no matter the actions or inactions of three-brained beings, the sacred impulse of the Teaching itself can never be made Tchik as it lawfully resonates in response whenever a certain ‘making-holy’ is made manifest.
The consequence of our Work is not just for us personally but as service for the lasting influence of The Work itself and the affirmation of our duty to lighten the Sorrow of Our Common Father.
How would Madame de Salzmann—the initiating force to rewrite Gurdjieff—how would she see this now? Would she see it differently through the vision now made possible from a Higher Realm?
With gratitude for Madame de Salzmann’s service to Mr. Gurdjieff during his lifetime that his original 1949 galley proofs would nevertheless still reach us.
Gratitude as well for the deepening feeling of conscience for all that is being given and revealed in order for us to see ourselves through this—The Unanswered Question. May the questioning itself be a reminding factor for Being. 
– Teresa Adams
The only text authorized by Gurdjieff of All and Everything, First Series, beelzebub’s tales to his grandson is the English text published in 1950 by Harcourt, Brace & Co. in America and Routledge & Kegan Paul in England. The unaltered republication of the 1950 Harcourt, Brace is currently published by Two Rivers Press, Aurora, Oregon.
Additionally, the only audio mp3 recording of the 1950 original text is by Anthony Blake, currently available through audible.com. Unfortunately, both the Dr. William Welch and Margaret Flinsch recordings are readings of the adulterated 1992 text, by Penguin/Viking Arkana.
Notes
- A nucleus of seventeen pupils. William Patrick Patterson, Georgi Ivanovitch Gurdjieff: The Man, The Teaching, His Mission [GIG] (Fairfax, CA. Arete Communications, 2014) 81.
- Under supernatural protection. GIG, 82.
- That sacred impulse. GIG, 82.
- De Salzmanns are presented to Gurdjieff. GIG, 83
- She—is intelligent. Patterson, GIG, 83. In Meetings with Remarkable Men, Gurdjieff explains that “intelligent” is used “not in the European sense” but how it is understood in Asia; that is, “not only by knowledge but by being.” In the meeting of 22 July 1943, he says: “He who has his body enslaved is intelligent. You understand what is meant by intelligent? Intelligent means he who directs his body.” William Patrick Patterson, Voices in the Dark: Esoteric, Occult & Secular Voices in Nazi-Occupied Paris 1940–44, Including Transcripts of Gurdjieff ’s Wartime Meetings (Fairfax, CA: Arete Communications, 2000) 66.
- A vision that could see everything. GIG, 83.
- Gurdjieff ’s Sacred Dances. GIG, 84.
- Responsible Members of the Institute. GIG, 138.
- Likely not among the travelers to America. SS Paris Passenger Lists 1895–1930, (https://www.ggarchives.com/OceanTravel/Passengers/Ships/Paris-PassengerLists.html). Madame de Salzmann’s name does not appear in the January 1924 SS Paris passenger list—the ship manifest.
- Demonstrations of Sacred Dances. GIG, 172–78 [New York], Boston and Chicago. GIG, 176.
- Will tasks. GIG, 240.
- Gurdjieff sends de Salzmanns to Germany. GIG, 240.
- Her French group now included.GIG, 395.
- Presents her French group. GIG, 401.
- Nine years and a war. GIG, 457–58.
- February 1950, the galley proofs Gurdjieff had held. J. Walter Driscoll and George Baker, “Gurdjieff: An Original Teacher,” Gurdjieff International Review, Fall 1997, https://www.gurdjieff.org/biography.htm.
- Circular letter. GIG, 470.
- I have decided to publish. GIG, 470.
- Publish as and when. Jeanne de Salzmann, “Foreword,” in G.I. Gurdjieff, Life Is Real Only Then, When ‘I Am’ (New York: Triangle Editions, 1975) xiii.
- Completed the French translation. “The Making of A&E by Paul Beekman Taylor,” https://gurdjieffclub.com/en/. “My information is that the 1992 text was a reworking of the 1950 text based on the French translation of Jeanne de Salzmann and her French collaborators.”
- In 1992—and again in 2006. The Copyright page of the adulterated 1992 text printed by Viking Arkana states the translation was under the initiative of Madame de Salzmann and started in the mid-1950s.
- Alarming amount of text deleted. Following strong protests to the adulterated 1992 text from other organizations and individuals in The Work who were outside the auspices of Madame de Salzmann’s umbrella of institutions, a reprint of the 1950 authoritative text was issued in 1999 by Penguin Publishing Group, UK.
- After completing and publishing the French edition in 1956. In the adulterated 1992 Viking Arkana text of Beelzebub’s Tales, the copyright page states, “The revision of the original 1950 translation was begun in the mid-1950s on the initiative of Jeanne de Salzmann, Gurdjieff ’s foremost pupil, and with her participation in the earlier years. The revision team included members of the Gurdjieff Foundation of New York, aided by members of the Gurdjieff Society (London) and the Institut Gurdjieff (Paris), as well as Triangle Editions.”
- Bon ton literary language. Gurdjieff, All and Everything: Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co, 1950) 7.
- He had overruled objections. “Editor’s Note on the Revised Edition,” in adulterated Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson: All and Everything/First Series (New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher / Penguin, 2006).
- Translation team. “Editor’s Note on the Revised Edition,” in the adulterated Beelzebub’s Tales.
- Strange pysche. Gurdjieff, All and Everything 1950, 312–13.
- Little by little they so changed. Gurdjieff, All and Everything 1950, 240.
- Make me Tchik. Per Bennett, “squash me like a louse.” GIG, 476.