The Measure of Time

285 pages

Italian, English language

Published April 17, 2021 by Bitter Lemon Press.

ISBN:: 978-978-191-339-6

(1 review)

One spring afternoon Lorenza shows up in Guerrieri’s office. Her son Jacopo, a small-time delinquent, stands convicted of the first-degree murder of a local drug dealer. Her trial lawyer has died, so for the appeal, she turns to Guerrieri. He is not convinced of the innocence of Lorenza’s son, nor does he have fond memories of how their relationship ended two decades earlier. Nevertheless, he accepts the case; perhaps to pay a melancholy homage to the ghosts of his youth.

1 edition

nicknicknicknick reviewed The Measure of Time by Gianrico Carofiglio (The Guido Guerrieri Series, #6)

The Measure of Time

3 stars

1) "Somebody once wrote that we should be capable of dying young. Not in the sense of really dying, but in the sense of stopping what we're doing when we realize we've exhausted our desire to do it, or our strength, or when we realize we've reached the limit of our talent, if we have any. Everything that comes after that limit is repetition. We should be capable of dying young in order to stay alive, but that almost never happens. I'd often thought that thanks to what I'd earned in my profession, of which I'd only spent a small part, I could quit, sell the practice and devote myself to something else. Travel, studying, reading. Maybe trying to write. Anything just to escape the grip of time. Time that kept passing, never changing. Nearly motionless in its daily repetition, yet fading fast."

2) "The only things I remember clearly …

1) "Somebody once wrote that we should be capable of dying young. Not in the sense of really dying, but in the sense of stopping what we're doing when we realize we've exhausted our desire to do it, or our strength, or when we realize we've reached the limit of our talent, if we have any. Everything that comes after that limit is repetition. We should be capable of dying young in order to stay alive, but that almost never happens. I'd often thought that thanks to what I'd earned in my profession, of which I'd only spent a small part, I could quit, sell the practice and devote myself to something else. Travel, studying, reading. Maybe trying to write. Anything just to escape the grip of time. Time that kept passing, never changing. Nearly motionless in its daily repetition, yet fading fast."

2) "The only things I remember clearly are the beginning and the end."

3) "The seafront was metaphysically beautiful. The air limpid, at once weightless and tangible. The perspective of the cast-iron lampposts suggested an army of spirit guides placed there to defend the city. On a day like this, if I'd had more time and gone a few miles further south, I'd have been able to see, clear in the distance, the outline of the Gargano promontory."

4) "Whenever I look back, whenever I look at the bigger picture of my actions, my emotions (including, above all, those I wasn't aware of), my ambiguous victories and very obvious defeats, I recognize certain fault lines, the results of subterranean upheavals in my consciousness. One of these is situated in that period in 1987. I went in a boy and came out, without realizing it, a man.

The encounter between Lorenza and me changed my life. I'm sure it didn't change hers.

She had been my involuntary mentor, the woman who had distractedly accompanied me through a metaphorical wood for a few months. Having emerged from that wood, I found myself alone in the open, dangerous spaces of adulthood."