He wasn't a cult leader nor did he become rich (his fortunes waxed and waned) despite being able to fleece people apparently at will. The fake canary caper is

He wasn't a cult leader nor did he become rich (his fortunes waxed and waned) despite being able to fleece people apparently at will. The fake canary caper is assumed to be autobiographical, as is the brazen theft of the "IP" of the plaster statue-maker, but the time he almost initiated an orgy and then shook everyone down for donations was reported by a (sympathetic!) eye-witness. It's not included in "Beelzebub's Tales" at any rate. You don't think L. Ron Hubbard is brilliant do you? I mean "Battlefield Earth" is pretty good (the book not the movie.) To me, comparing Hubbard to Gurdjieff is like comparing Nicholas Taleb to Isaac Newton.