Review: 'The Yage Letters - Redux' by Burroughs and Ginsberg

Originally published by City Lights in 1963 'The Yage Letters' has since been republished 3 times. This fourth edition 'The Yage Letters: Redux' was published in 2006; it is edited by Oliver Harris who?s also included a thorough introduction of the text's history. The book is presented as an epistolary of largely letters between William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg; who both chronicle their travels to South America in search of the hallucinogen yage.

The introduction, written by the editor Oliver Harris, looks in some detail about the events on which the content is based -- essentially some Burroughs and Ginsberg biography as background but it adds great insight into the text -- and looks at how the events led to the first publication of the book by City Lights. Ginsberg had already persuaded several magazines to publish excerpts of the original document -- 'In Search of Yage' -- previously. Harris also writes in some depth on the editing process over the four editions. The book is a fine example of how multiple-authorship and editorial scholarship give a text its own life...