Revolutionary Letters

Expanded edition of the classic City Lights book of eco-feminist-Zen Beat poetry.

Fifty years ago, in 1968, Diane di Prima began writing her "revolutionary letters," a series of poems composed of a potent blend of utopian anarchism and ecological awareness, projected through a zen-tinged feminist lens. In 1971, Lawrence Ferlinghetti published them in the first edition of Revolutionary Letters as Number 27 in the City Lights Pocket Poets Series, with a cover featuring his own distinctive calligraphic interpretation of the title.

By turns a handbook of countercultural activity and a broadside against the repressive state apparatus, Revolutionary Letters remains one of the vital classics of American poetry. Di Prima has published four subsequent editions (three of them with City Lights), adding new material each time. Revolutionary Letters: Expanded Edition is the latest iteration of this 50-year project, published in a deluxe, board-bound edition and featuring the original cover. Beginning with the poems from the first edition along with what was added along the way, the collection ends with di Prima's latest "letters," written in the decade between 2007-2017.

From "Revolutionary Letter #1":


I have just realized that the stakes are myself / I have no other / ransom money, nothing to break or barter but my life

Editie extinsa a cartii clasice City Lights a poeziei eco-feministe-Zen Beat. In urma cu cincizeci de ani, in 1968, Diane di Prima a inceput sa isi scrie „scrisorile revolutionare”, o serie de poezii compuse dintr-un amestec puternic de anarhism utopic si constientizare ecologica. , proiectat printr-o lentila feminista cu nuante zen. In 1971, Lawrence Ferlinghetti le-a publicat in prima editie a Revolutionarelor scrisori sub forma numarului 27 din seria City Lights Pocket Poets Series, cu o coperta cu interpretarea sa distinctiva caligrafica a titlului. Prin transformarea unui manual de activitate contraculturala si un aspect general impotriva aparat de stat represiv, Literele Revolutionare ramane unul dintre clasicii vitali ai poeziei americane.