Saving Time

Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock

De: Jenny Odell

Narrado por: Kristen Sieh

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “The visionary author of How to Do Nothing returns to challenge the notion that ‘time is money.’ . . . Expect to feel changed by this radical way of seeing.”—Esquire

“One of the most important books I’ve read in my life.”—Ed Yong, author of An Immense World

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: Harper’s Bazaar, Esquire, Chicago Public Library, Electric Lit

In her first book, How to Do Nothing, Jenny Odell wrote about the importance of disconnecting from the “attention economy” to spend time in quiet contemplation. But how can we reclaim our time?

In order to answer this seemingly simple question, Odell took a deep dive into the fundamental structure of our society and found that the clock we live by was built for profit, not people. This is why our lives, even in leisure, have come to seem like a series of moments to be bought, sold, and processed ever more efficiently. Odell shows us how our painful relationship to time is inextricably connected not only to persisting social inequities but to the climate crisis, existential dread, and a lethal fatalism.

This dazzling, subversive, and deeply hopeful book offers us different ways to experience time—inspired by pre-industrial cultures, ecological cues, and geological timescales—that can bring within reach a more humane, responsive way of living. As planet-bound animals, we live inside shortening and lengthening days alongside gardens growing, birds migrating, and cliffs eroding; the stretchy quality of waiting and desire; the way the present may suddenly feel marbled with childhood memory; the slow but sure procession of a pregnancy; the time it takes to heal from injuries. Odell urges us to become stewards of these different rhythms of life in which time is not reducible to standardized units and instead forms the very medium of possibility.

Saving Time tugs at the seams of reality as we know it—the way we experience time itself—and rearranges it, imagining a world not centered on work, the office clock, or the profit motive. If we can “save” time by imagining a life, identity, and source of meaning outside these things, time might also save us.

An Interdisciplinary Masterpiece

Odell’s meditative tone continues to blossom in this beautifully woven tapestry of perspectives concerning our most ephemeral medium.

Pulling together stories from the world too few see

I would recommend this book to anyone willing to indulge and awaken their own senses. You will see the ordinary as anything but. You might also extend your life.

Really profound reflections on the premise of time

This is a series of smart, thoughtful reflections on the nature of time and our concepts of time set against small and large things around us, and our relationship to earth, each other, our work, our joy, our death, and what it means to “spend” time. I loved the smart considerations of so many thinkers on productivity, indigenous knowledge, labor practices and history, and philosophical considerations of time. This book will really let you think, if you’re open to it. I loved meditating on time with Jenny O’dell. Gave me a lot to think about. All such meaty concepts deserve a book from an artist and philosopher, as opposed to the many “productivity bros,” (we have heard enough from them).

A first-world problem, immortalized..and why not!?

There's a lot to unpack here, and I don't know where to start.

The perspective is empowering and fresh.

However:
It would be awesome if this book applied to a broader portion of the populous. There's no reason in today's world of automation for people not to live at a higher standard. There's also a fair bit of past problems still affecting the poorest/downtrodden communities (especially those of color). Gentrification, and slumlords have ensured the price of entry to the "middle class" is almost a joke of unattainability to 34%, or more, of the population in the "greatest country" on earth.

A beautiful meditation on life

This book was a joy to listen to. The prose was so poetic, especially in the second half of the book. The author brought up so many big questions and issues and explored them in such an interesting, nuanced and inspiring way. It inspired me reexamine my ideas and assumptions about time, purpose, the present moment, the natural world, death, and ultimately, our collective experience of life.