The Yage Letters
An early epistolary novel by William Burroughs, whose 1951 account of himself as as junkie, published under the pseudonym William Lee, ended Yage may be the final fix. In letters to Allen Ginsberg, an unknown young poet in New York, his journey to the Amazon jungle is recorded, detailing picaresque incidents of a search for a telepathic-hallucinogenic-mind-expanding drug called yage (Ayahuasca, or Banisteripsis Caape), used by Amazon indian doctors for finding lost objects, mostly bodies and souls. Author and recipient of these letters met again in New York, Christmas 1953, and edited the writings to form this single book. The correspondence contains the first seeds of the later Burroughsian fantasy in Naked Lunch. Seven years later Ginsberg in Peru writes his old guru an account of his own visions and terrors with the same drug, appealing for further counsel. Burroughs' mysterious reply is sent. The volume concludes with two epilogues: a short note from Ginsberg on his return from the Orient years later reassuring Self that he is still here on earth, and a final poetic cut-up by Burroughs, I am dying, Meester?
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- "Cronopios and Famas", by Julio Cortázar - I read it for the first time when I was about 13 and for many years I reread at least once per year;
"Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" (Robert M. Pirsig)
"The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea" (Yukio Mishima)
"The Yage Letters" (William Burroughs)
"The Old Ways" (Gary Snyder)
"Life and Death (Elementary Go Series #4)", by James Davies. Really - I studied that one very seriously.
Note: I answered just the "What book had a big impact on you as a child or teenager?" part, and I ignored that you are building a library for your children and asking for recommendations...
- I tripped once years ago on an extract of morning glory seeds that a genius friend of my sister concocted. (Essentially lysergic acid amide, plus maybe some other alkaloids, look it up if you're that interested.)
There was no preparation as far as set and setting. Basically I was a chronic drug-using teenager who was trying something new. Took the stuff before a concert and began tripping during the opening act. Had a great time. Saw some weird shit. Blacked out for a while as usual because I was also smoking a lot of pot and drinking beer for hydration.
Somehow reconnected with the people I went with and got a ride home, with some intervening adventures on the way. Lay down in bed to sleep and that's when it got weird. Hard to describe and kind of boring if you weren't there (but you might have been! ;-))
Woke up the next morning still tripping balls. Couldn't stop it, got kind of scared. Called people and said shit I don't remember and that they still won't repeat.
Finally stopped tripping later that day, and was exhausted for another day. Found out later from the genius that the dose was roughly equivalent to 350-500 mcg of LSD (i.e., a lot).
Read The Yage Letters shortly after that. Haven't tripped since. Occasionally consider it since I've done a lot more reading and work in the 37 years since that experience, but now it's a hipster thing so it's embarrassing to admit. I mean, the New Yorker is writing articles about it. You don't even have to dig through a few different grungy bookstores to find a copy of the Beat take on it from the '50s.
So, probably never yage / ayahuasca, but maybe someday a tab of acid. Or maybe not. I'm a lot more self-aware and enlightened than I was at 17, but I think that's mostly because I've lived another 37 years and survived all the trouble along the path, not because I tripped once.
P.S. People had these exact same kinds of conversations on this topic 35 years ago.
