Part I: Chapters 1-15 Summary

The main character, Phaedrus, is introduced the morning after a night of drinking. He is waking in the berth of his sailboat with Lila, a woman he met in the bar. The reader is taken back to the scene at the bar the previous evening, and is shown how Phaedrus encounters Lila. Phaedrus is there drinking with his new friends, Capella and Rigel. They are discussing his travels up the Hudson river by boat. Lila enters the scene in a rage, seeking out her boyfriend and his new girlfriend. When Phaedrus meets Lila, he gets the feeling he has seen her before and recounts the times and places where that may have occurred. Lila tells Phaedrus that the boyfriend invited her on a trip and is now switching his affections to someone new. Lila and Phaedrus drink...