It’s the summer of 1964. A retired university professor, Alessandro Giuliani, and a young factory worker, Nicolò, set out to walk 70 kilometers (about 44 miles) from Rome to the village of Monte Prato. Along the way, musing on his rich and tragic past, Alessandro shares some of his memories and what he has learned with his illiterate and naïve companion. He revisits his privileged youth in a loving family, his university studies in beauty and art, the horrors and hammer blows he experienced in World War I, and his love for the woman Ariane and their son, both now gone to the grave….