The American poet Emily Dickinson still remains a mystery. She was born in 1830 and died 55 years later in the same house; never married and had no children; wrote more than a thousand poems, of which she published less than a dozen during her lifetime; almost never left her hometown of Amherst.

"Cities on Paper" is a vivid literary portrait of a writer who was able to create entire worlds without leaving her own garden. Weaving biographical information with her own fantasies, Dominique Fortier has created a deep and subtle narrative about the freedom of imagination and the nature of creativity, about the places in which we live and which live inside us.

Dominique Fortier is a writer and translator, born in Quebec in 1972, defended her thesis on French literature at McGill University, worked in various publishing houses; author of five novels. Winner of the French Gens de mer Prize (Sailors' Prize) and the Governor General's Award, Canada's highest literary prize. The book "Cities on Paper" was awarded the prestigious Renaudot Prize for essays (2020).