Strange Life of Ivan Osokin

"The feeling for the suspense of the present moment, which hangs like a drop of rain upon the window, containing a whole world in itself." — V. S. Pritchett

Ivan Osokin is in utter despair. He's failed at school, he's broke, and the woman he adores has just abandoned him. If only he could live his life over again and avoid all his mistakes! A chance encounter with a magician provides Ivan with that precise opportunity, and he's sent back in time to correct his wrong turns. But even with a fresh start, he's helpless to fix the errors of his past.
This intriguing novel by P. D. Ouspensky, one of the most important and influential figures in twentieth-century occultism, inspired the movie Groundhog Day. Set in the final years of czarist Russia, the tale unfolds in Moscow and Paris and offers an imaginative exploration of one of the chief themes in Ouspensky's works: the concept of eternal recurrence, which proposes that our endless repetition of missteps only can be halted by the kind of change that comes from within.

Along with Aleister Crowley, Madame Blavatsky, and George Gurdjieff, P. D. Ouspensky (1878 –1947) ranked among the most important and influential figures in the occult movements of the 20th century. With such books as A New Model of the Universe, The Fourth Dimension, Tertium Organum, In Search of the Miraculous, and The Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution, he earned a loyal following among those seeking a deeper knowledge of themselves and their lives, and of the meaning of human existence. Strange Life of Ivan Osokin was his only novel.

CONTENTS

1. The Parting
2. The Three Letters
3. The Man in the Dark Blue Overcoat
4. The End of the Romance
5. At the Magician's
6. Morning
7. Thoughts
8. The Past
9. A Dream
10. The Schoolboy
11. Mother
12. Monday
13. Reality and the Fairy Tale
14. Punished
15. Boredom
16. Zeus
17. The School Sanatorium
18. At Home
19. Tanechka
20. Uncle
21. The Devil's Mechanics
22. Paris
23. Zinaida
24. The Inevitable
25. A Winter's Day
26. The Turn of the Wheel
27. On the Threshold
Conclusion
About the Author