A film about Edmund White, the American writer, icon of the gay world. He was also an immense writer of sensitivity and of style. He is the author of a trilogy of novel-autobiographies: A Boy's Own Story, The Beautiful Room is Empty, and The Farewell Symphony. The film discusses with Edmund White his journey of desire, his "states of desire," and his influences. White talks about desire in all its forms: desire for other men, desire for bodies, and desire and masochism.