When a young father is hired for an English instructorship position, he struggles to balance playing the role of a teacher and meeting the university’s demands for a published scholar.

A professor finds himself attracted to one of his students, allowing her to skip the final exams - but her resultant grade causes her to lash out at him and reveal harsh truths about his own life that he finds difficult to accept.

A man recalls his intimate friendship with his former English professor, who resolved to fuel his unsatisfied desire for playwriting during the time they were apart. In their reunion decades later, instead of the brilliant play he promised, the professor shows his former student a disturbing product of his mental instability.

A creative writing teacher sits through a conference with one his favorite students. He takes us on a journey through the characters in the story, and in his life.

On a train ride to a metallurgical conference in Chicago, a consultant tries to avoid the debate between pure and applied sciences, but he cannot avoid it when he gets cornered in the washroom by two professors and an undecided bright new recruit.

When a philosophy professor is called into a committee meeting for inappropriate behavior, she stews over what got her here, and how.

A mathematics professor must contend with faith, loneliness, and academic mediocrity when a past mistake comes crashing back into his life.

A teacher on the Lower East side meets a friendly man with a presence resembling a dead English poet.

A research psychologist visits a peculiar asylum patient who recounts his life story. The patient warns the researcher about how obsession with the pursuit of knowledge can make one lose sight of their humanity until it is unsalvageable.

A female professor at a contemporary university remembers an old conversation with a former teacher of hers, which prompts her to reconsider her job, solitude, and love of reading.