GURDJIEFF, G.I. – Life is real only then, when I am - Integral Book

I took The New York Times, a huge, thick newspaper, especially onSundays, but as I paid for it I realized that reading an English paperwould not be the right thing, nor— as I do not have the automaticcommand of this language which comes only with practice—give methe desired effect on which I had counted for being able to forgetmyself and fall asleep.So I asked the newspaperman if he, or anyone else in theneighborhood, had European newspapers, for instance Greek, Armenianor Russian.He answered that he had none, but that three streets further on manyRussian Jews were living, and all the newsdealers there had Russiannewspapers.I went in the direction he showed me. Traffic in the streets wasbeginning to increase.On the first corner of the designated street was a newspaper booth, towhich I went and asked for a Russian newspaper.The newsdealer asked me at once in Russian, "Which one,countryman, Russkoi Slovo or Russky Golos?"And thus I learned for the first time that two newspapers of thesenames appear in New York.In order that the reader may discover the necessary connection to thissecond coincidence here described, I must say in advance that for thelast ten years, that is, since I began to write, I have read scarcelyanything, not only no newspapers and books but no letters or telegramseither.I took both Russian newspapers, drove home and lay down again.One of them was unbelievably thick for a Russian paper, and withthis I began.On glancing through it, I soon gathered that this paper wascelebrating its twenty-fifth anniversary, which explained its thickness.