Upon returning to Paris after a decade-long hiatus wandering the French countryside and writing an epic, a poet encounters an enigmatic young woman who believes he is a god and wants to be his disciple,

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.

In California, a young woman reflects on her relationship to her father while working on a novel. Through reading her father’s novel, she understands their relationship through his eyes.

A Canadian graduate student and his wife are living in France and often socialize with their peers at concerts and dinner parties. They soon make friends with an established novelist, but as the student continues to meet people he begins to question who he can trust and who his real friends are.

Having sacrificed his dream job to financially support his marriage, a man realizes there is sexual tension between his wife and his friend. Ultimately, he makes tough decisions about both his friendship and his marriage.

An overweight journalist navigates a strange friendship with a legendary writer and finds his life curiously entwined with one of the writer's students, a fiery young girl.

A Jewish communist quit working at an editorial bureau where his co-workers are bothered by his leftist ideology because of his boss' praises of him.

A Confederate officer begrudgingly fights in the American Civil War until his disastrous last battle helps seal the fate of the war for good. After the war, he constantly repents for his critical mistakes until, decades later, he comes to a shocking revelation about the fateful battle.

Searching for a muse to inspire a novel he is attempting to write, an author in San Francisco finds his passions ignited by something much more sinister.

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