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Chapter 1

• Centered on themes of identity and self-discovery, Peter Matthiessen's In Paradise takes place in Auschwitz, where 140 people come together to participate in a meditation retreat at the former Nazi death camp.

• Part I: “A Guest of Poland,” Chapter 1 opens as Clements Olin (who is not named until later in the novel) arrives in Poland; after taking a cab from the airport into Cracow, he discovers that buses to his destination won't be available before spring and the next train won't leave until the evening.

• A couple named Mirek and Wanda at a cafe make out Clements' pigeon Polish and offer to take him to a nearby museum and other historic sites in the city; the museum, however, is closed.

• Mirek and Wanda take Clements to visit a cafe in Kasimierz, "the old Jewish quarter named after King Kasimierz of the sixteenth century."

• Mirek and Wanda insist on...

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