The Staircase Shuffle, Jon Woodson, Wild Pineapple Press, Providence R.I., 2024 (268pp.)
I have already favourably commented on some of Prof Woodson’s work (see the links at the bottom of this page). I should also note that, in my opinion (one which I shared with several persons who spoke with me), Jon Woodson stole the show at the recent CSWR conference at Harvard of 5 December 2024, on Gurdjieff and his legacy. Many came to see and hear some of the luminaries of the Gurdjieff world, and although they had not heard of Woodson, they were forcibly struck by the brio and humour of his delivery, and his clarity and content. When I look back and ask myself, “what did the speakers actually say?” it is Prof Cusack, Sutcliffe, and Woodson with Richard Temple who come clearest to mind as having actually had something interesting to say. I am not running anyone else down: I am, rather, selecting these for special praise.
Although I am friendly with Woodson, we communicate too infrequently to be properly called “friends” with the habit of association which that almost sacred word implies. So, I think I can be impartial in my review of this novel; and I do hope I am being fair and not excessively laudatory, because I am going to suggest that it is an excellent novel, and – further – it shows that something of the actual taste of the Gurdjieff Work can be conveyed by that genre. In fact, it actually provides more of a sense of the wonder of the practical Work than most of the books which treat of it directly.
The promotional material on the back furnishes a whiff of the contents: “In 1931 Melvin Tolson went to Harlem to study at Columbia University. He carried a gun called Family Man to remind him to come back home. From day one he was swept up in events that challenged everything he knew to be true or possible. He might make it back to East Texas but who and what would he be? Jon Woodson is an internationally recognised scholar of literary esotericism. His many books explicate the influence of the occult on canonical American writers.” (Incidentally, Tolson was indeed acquainted with Gurdjieff’s ideas, through – I believe, Jean Toomer. I recommend the movie, The Great Debaters, although it says nothing of Toomer let alone Gurdjieff.)
Now for Woodson’s novel. First, it is well-written. It tells a good story, and tells it well. Second, it sets out in an easily accessible manner, how the writers of the “Harlem Renaissance” could have shared what they understood of the Gurdjieff method, and inscribed it in a code which they mutually understood. (see the links in Note 1 below)
I shall not attempt to describe the plot, not because it is complex: in fact it is gripping. We are swept up, as Tolson is, in the novel. I will briefly mention the esoteric content. Here, the descriptions of a person meeting the Work, and being introduced to the basic concepts and methods, such as self-observation, and the much under-emphasised method of playing a role consciously (as opposed to having roles played through us) provide the zest in this oeuvre.
Not a few of the insights are powerful, e.g. “The Work sees race as another form of sleep.” (241)
“Awareness is very complex. One should use total awareness, If one merely sees his hand, he is not observing it. One can observe with his eyes closed.” (199)
“Assumptions are only valid if you know enough.” (168)
“The Method had the Hidden Learning and promised to turn me into a normal man. It is said in the Method that the path to the development is from the genius, psychic, talented, through to the ordinary and normal.” (87)
There is a fresh, almost startlingly fresh, application of the basic method through the 13 pages of chapter 17, which opens with the words “Self-observation and non-identification. Aids to observation.” (129) There follow 30 aphorisms, each of which is followed by a segment of the narrative, so that the narrative applies and interprets the aphorism. The aphorisms – taken directly from the 48 questions in Gurdjieff’s Emissary in New York, 553-55, include the following: “1. Place the organism in strange or unpleasant circumstances.” (129) “2. The effort to realise: I have a body” (130) “The effort to realise that I descended into and became attached to this organism (this animal) for the purpose of developing it.” (130) “26. Make gratuitous efforts” (139) “28. Pursue an impossible task.” “29. Go against inclination.” (140) Perhaps somewhere, in some higher dimension, Orage is quietly smiling. This chapter left me wondering: do I ever employ the methods so comprehensively and effectively? And yet, how long ago did I read Orage’s 48 questions?
Incidentally, D.M. Dooling, who met Gurdjieff, and founded what was called the “crypto-Gurdjieffian Parabola,” used code in her most public writing. As her daughter said: “What she wrote for the magazine never directly quoted or even referred to Gurdjieff’s ideas. Instead she specialised in what she called “double talk” – expressing a truth or an idea directly, through story and her use of poetic language. … she (Dooling) said, “My aim is to present the truths of the great religious traditions and allow them to be illuminated by Mr Gurdjieff’s ideas. But never to state his ideas directly.” (The Paths I Found, 13).
As Woodson has demonstrated in his work, Dooling was not the first to hit upon the technique of “double talk,” or to think it desirable. Then, this may be more subjective in that others may not have began to take for granted the miraculous possibilities of the Work, but Woodson’s book reminded me of the greatness of its aspirations, the sheer power of its methods, and of how it was intended to have an effect upon the people and world around us. If some of us have begun to take the Work for granted, and to settle for self-improvement, this book may be a welcome splash of cold water on the face.
Note 1: My other reviews of Prof Woodson’s work
review of Jon Woodson, Oragean Modernism, in Journal for the Academic Study of Religion, 27(3), 392-394 (2014)
Note 2: 176 I believe “In Search of the Miraculous” should be “Tertium Organum.” The English translation of the second edition of the latter had been released and had found a relatively large and appreciative readership in the USA.
