In the sprawling, chaotic world of underground literature, some books achieve fame. Others achieve infamy. And then there are the ones that achieve myth .

What we know (or think we know) is that the original manuscript of Historia del Futuro appeared briefly in a small publishing fair in Buenos Aires in 1978. It was a thin, stapled booklet with a plain black cover. Within 72 hours, the author allegedly withdrew every single copy, claiming the text was "unstable."

But this is not hopeful sci-fi. Historia del Futuro is relentlessly bleak.

But here is the catch: for most of its existence, you couldn’t actually read it. First, a necessary disclaimer: "David Diamond" is almost certainly a pseudonym. Depending on which rumor you follow, Diamond was either a disgraced Argentine anthropologist, a Chilean occultist fleeing the Pinochet regime, or a "future historian" who claimed his manuscript was dictated to him by a machine he built in his garage.

David Diamond’s Historia del Futuro ( History of the Future ) belongs firmly in the third category. If you have heard the name whispered in literary forums, rare book collector groups, or conspiracy theory subreddits, you know that this isn’t just a book. It is a riddle wrapped in a legend.

Only five original copies are rumored to exist today. In 2019, one allegedly sold at a private auction in London for $47,000. The buyer’s identity remains unknown. The book defies easy genre classification. On the surface, it is a work of speculative non-fiction. Diamond wrote the book as a historical account written from the year 2059, looking back at the "Late Information Age" (roughly 2020–2045).