Part One, The Garden of Forking Paths, The Circular Ruins Summary

A man comes to shore in a canoe at a place where there are the circular ruins of a once great temple. The man crawls to shore and goes to sleep. A group of men nearby bring him food, so the man feels no need to do anything but sleep as often as possible. As the man sleeps, he has dreams of teaching a classroom of young people with the knowledge that only one of these students is worthy of all he needs to teach and one day he will have to choose that one student. However, before the man can complete this task, he finds himself unable to dream any longer. For a time the man attempts to recreate the dream as it was...