Beelzebubs-Tales-to-His-Grandson-by-G-I-Gurdjieff

ear of a more or less attentive and conscious listener, sound like a collectionof Turkish, Persian, French, Kurdish, and Russian tones, mixed with other"indigestible" and inarticulate noises.Almost the same might be said about my native language, Greek, which Ispoke in childhood, and the taste of whose "automatic associative power" Istill retain. I could, I dare say, express anything I wish in it even now, but it isimpossible for me to employ it here for the simple and rather comical reasonthat someone must transcribe my writings and translate them into otherlanguages. And who could do this?It can be said with certainty that even the best expert in modern Greekwould understand simply nothing of what I would write in the tongue Iassimilated in childhood, because during the last thirty or forty years my dear"compatriots," inflamed with the desire to be at all costs like the representativesof contemporary civilization even in their conversation, have treatedmy dear native language just as the Armenians, anxious to become Russian"intelligentsia," have treated theirs.The Greek language whose spirit and essence were transmitted to me byheredity and the language now spoken by contemporary Greeks are as muchalike as, according to the expression of Mullah Nasr Eddin, "a nail is like arequiem."So what is now to be done?Ah me! Never mind, esteemed buyer of my wiseacrings. As long as there isplenty of French armagnac and Khaizarian "bastourma," I shall find a wayeven out of this tight corner.I am an old hand at this.In life, I have so often gotten into difficult situations and out of them thatthis has become almost a matter of habit with me.Meanwhile, I shall write partly in Russian and partly in Armenian, all themore since among those people always