This edition of Che Guevara’s The Bolivian Diary has been prepared by the Che Guevara Studies Center, Havana. It is based on the first authorized edition published in Spanish in 1968 by the Cuban Book Institute. Certain pages that did not appear in that first edition have now been incorporated. Those diary entries, originally withheld by the Bolivian government for “security” reasons, are dated: January 4, 5, 8, and 9; February 8 and 9; March 14; April 4 and 5; June 9 and 10; and July 4 and 5.
The text of the first edition has also been thoroughly checked and revised against facsimiles of the diary itself in order to clarify terms or words that were illegible. In the few remaining instances where this has not been possible, the text is marked “illegible in the original.”
Che used a variety of noms de guerre or nicknames throughout the diary and sometimes the same person was referred to by several different names. For this reason, a glossary has been prepared to aid the reader.
Che’s spelling of place names in the area of Bolivia in which the guerrilla force operated also varied, and this is reflected in the diary. Some of these names have been standardized to assist the reader, for example, in the case of the Ñacahuazú River. Generally, however, the integrity of the original diary has been maintained.
Several key documents related to the Bolivian revolutionary movement at the time have been included as appendices. Throughout the diary, however, Che makes references to other documents that have not been reproduced here.
Ocean Press