Since 1936, the New Directions in Prose and Poetry anthologies have served as vehicles for the presentation of new and variant trends in world literature. The twenty-eighth number in the series, which draws on authors from five different countries, places a special emphasis on prose––narrative, dramatic, and impressionistic; a relatively small but choice selection of poetry is included as well. Walter Abish’s entertaining fiction “Minds Meet" leads off the collection. Following it are: “Kayanerenhkowa,” an excerpt from the Nicaraguan poet Ernesto Cardenal’s celebrated Homage to the American Indians: a brooding autobiographical novella, “Cog-wheels,” by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, the pioneer of modern Japanese literature who wrote “Rashomon”; new work by the Objectivist poet Carl Rakosi; “Brain Cell 9,999,999,999,” a short story by Paul West; three poems by Roberto Sanesi (Italy); James Purdy’s arresting one-act play, “Wedding Finger”; groups of prose sketches by Frederick Morgan and Faye Sobkowsky; “Tendril in the Mesh,” a love poem by William Everson (Brother Antoninus); a short story, “Growth,” by Frederick Busch; Jerome Rothenberg’s “A Book of Histories,” a section of his work-in-progress, Poland; a short fiction by Coleman Dowell; and a selection of verse by Angel González (Spain).