"Stories" is the second prose volume in the Rolf Dieter Brinkmann edition, following "The Film in Words" (1982). It includes, in addition to the debut "In the Pit" (1962), previously unpublished prose from the years 1959/61, which Brinkmann titled "What Fell Among the Thorns" in the manuscript. The six pieces contained within are explorations of childhood, written in inner monologue, both intimate and alienated. They reflect the rupture between his youth in the small town of Vechta and his bookselling apprenticeship in Essen.