As most Boswellians know, the journals and personal papers of James Boswell were missing for more than a century, presumed destroyed. In the 1920s and 1930s, however, scores of papers turned up at Malahide Castle north of Dublin, the home of one of Boswell's descendants, Lord Talbot de Malahide, and at Fettercairn House near Aberdeen, the home of a descendant of Boswell's friend and main literary executor Sir William Forbes. Most of the papers were bought by Colonel Ralph Isham, who, in the 1940s, sold most of the collection to Yale University.

Collectively known as Boswell's Journals, 12 volumes of the so-called trade editions have been published by Yale University since 1950. In all, they cover the life of James Boswell from the Fall of 1762 until his death in 1795. However, not all of Boswell's journals have been recovered, and so, in order to create some totality and continuity, the actual books, with a few exceptions, are actually made up from journal fragments, Boswell's memos to himself, various notes, fragments from Life of Johnson, and examples from his voluminous correspondence. So, while, for example, his London Journal and his Journal of his Grand Tour are pretty much complete journals, Boswell in Holland actually consists mostly of letters and memos, while only his last month in Holland is described in the form of an actual journal - the rest went missing in his own time.

Some of the journals have also been published in limited, numbered deluxe editions - with the exception of the very first deluxe edition, the only difference between the standard and the deluxe editions are some additional portraits added to the deluxe editions, apart from them being of a better quality than the ordinary trade editions. To the very first deluxe edition, however - that of his London Journal 1762-63 - a two month long coherent journal of Boswell's jaunt through parts of Southern Scotland is prefixed. For that reason alone, if not for the luxurious binding and paper quality, the first deluxe edition is worth owning - it was published in 1,050 numered copies, and is usually available for between £50 and £200 via the Abebooks used books search engine.

Complete list of the standard Yale Trade editions of the Journals of James Boswell

• Boswell's London Journal 1762-63 (1950)
• Boswell in Holland 1763-64 (1952)
• Boswell on the Grand Tour: Germany, Switzerland 1764 (1953)
• Boswell on the Grand Tour: Italy, Corsica and France 1765-1766 (1955)
• Boswell in Search of a Wife 1766-1769 (1958)
• Boswell for the Defence 1769-1774 (1960)
• Boswell: The Ominous Years 1774-1776 (1963)
• Boswell in Extremes 1776-1778 (1970)
• Boswell, Laird of Auchinleck 1778-1782 (1977)
• Boswell: The Applause of the Jury 1782-1785 (1981)
• Boswell: The English Experiment 1785-1789 (1986)
• Boswell: The Great Biographer 1789-1795 (1989)