Benigni in paradise

It started as the day was ending. The public sat or stood outside the lecture theatre in the light of the setting sun and the beginnings of an evening breeze. Coloured photocopies of Italian verse and its translation were distributed to the audience outside who watched a large screen hopefully and to the other guests ensconced within who watched the stage for the emergence of the Italian actor and filmmaker.

After a dynamic introduction to the evening, pronounced by Gloria Lauri Lucente, the audiences watched clips of Roberto Benigni's films and his performances. Nothing, however, prepared the viewers for the emergence of the poet-artist who provided first a burlesque show in Maltese, Italian and English as he enacted the role of stumped scholar with the venerated Dantean scholar Robert Hollander and then swiftly donned the cap of an erudite impassioned lecturer enunciating Dante's verse and vocabulary.

The explanation embraced philosophy, Greek mythology, theology, the role of women and the Mother of God, the obscure and the obvious; a macrocosm in a microcosm of the carefully selected word or phrase - apparently experienced and deeply understood by Mr Benigni himself.

Just as minutes earlier he had the audience riveted by his use of Maltese, humorous improvisation (although quoting Balzac's admonition of never joking with poetry), the drawing in of Carmelo, the cameraman, into his mise en scène and the dramatisation of a student cleverly attempting a cover-up of an overt lack of study, now the contrast emerged as starkly as the night sky.

As the birds vociferously recited their retirement to their beds in the trees lining the campus, the inspiration of the medieval poet played its God-given verse through its humble but capable Italian instrument who delivered a melodious rendition of the canto from Dante's Paradiso. After the critique of the verse, much of it sounded familiar and pleasant to follow.

God (pronounced by Dante himself as being the author of the cantos, though the gods and muses had inspired it) is described by Mr Benigni as an unseeable, untouchable great being who dwells among us all, omniscient (and seeing a range of things; the great mechanism of an insect's wings as well as aeons of existences and contemporary happenings), has His name uttered by new-born babes in their innocence and becomes palpable by those in love and those on a journey such as the poet's to find themselves.

In a moment, through Mr Benigni's recitation, scholarly interpretation and Dantean inspiration merge. All Summa, all saints, all beings, all desires, cease. There is, as St Augustine describes, that great cessation of searching when the true meeting takes place. The audience, along with Mr Benigni and Dante, taste an epiphany. The coloured fairy lights perched in the Malta University trees sparkle. Realisation shines. A sense of paradise dawns. A thunderous applause follows.

While following the rule of not recording or filming the delivery, for most of us among the audience this was a memorable evening.

The sound of Mr Benigni speaking Dante left an indelible resonance in the hearts of the Maltese present at the University on April 23, 2008.