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

An American writer travels to Sophia where he meets a famous poetess. He falls in love with her and her attitude.

An old linguistics researcher is ousted from his university position on the frontier of a small island he acculturated. Upon his return home, he begins to believe that he and his life's work are marginal.

In an unlikely encounter, a homeless teenage boy recounts harsh events of his life to a writer. He nonchalantly tells of an employer whose assignments caused him to have permanent physical and mental damage.

A rambunctious teenager with an inquisitive mind causes much grief for all his New England family and neighbors when he visits them in the summer of 1914, on the eve of World War I.

A young couple obsessed with syntax sets off to meet their favorite author.

In a small town, a resident watches as the people and place change. He recounts eight seemingly disparate stories, but the town connects them all.

A couple with a rocky marriage argues over fetching a newspaper, which becomes a catalyst for their impending divorce. When they unexpectedly reunite over a decade later, the former couple witnesses how their lives disparately transformed thanks to the fateful newspaper.

A Black, southern house servant with internalized racism, joins her mistress on a visit to another region, where she observes Black people acting with something she abhors: autonomy.

A daughter and a mother wonder what the lesson of their story is.