Originally, Foer's libretto was to be set seven times, to seven different scores by seven different composers. "But the more we thought about it," Foer told the Los Angeles Times earlier this year, "the more we thought it would be really boring."

The libretto is now divided into seven parts, with seven composers— Miroslav Srnka, Karim Haddad, Bernhard Lang, Catherine Miliken, Jos_ Maria Sanchez-Verd‹, Annette Schmucki, and Larisa Vrhunc—setting different sections.

According to the Times, the opera is set in an unidentified institution inhabited by people who can't use language; the work is narrated by a prison guard.