Dante knew that if we don't get it right, it's like we never lived.
--Roberto Benigni

Party people,



Ok. We got tickets to TuttoDante. We are in line outside the Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco. For the sake of time, let's say it is already established that Roberto Benigni is one of the most famous avatars in Italy, a comedian of elevated intelligence, a political voice, a movie star (Academy Award winner for Life is Beautiful, equally famous for 2002's Pinocchio). Benigni would be performing in only a few minutes and I see Tom Waits out by the stairs.

A different crowd at the hall - at least for someone who is used concerts where there are people down to get drunk, dance in the aisles, maybe find someone with whom to hook up. To fuck. To let the music fuck their ears with bass. One more time, fuck.

Half of the crowd is older, in shirt and tie and dress and corsage. They speak Italian better than they do English. Pretty shiny gator shoes. A man wears an eye patch because there is something wrong with his eye, rather than his ego. And the vocabulary they speak with has gravity.

College students are there, too. Guys with vintage hats covering their descheveled hair, trying to impress girls with their cultural sensitivity. Girls who don't care about the guys they're with, just there to see Benigni, who will soon be in the stands screaming for him, they're there too.

My wife stands next to me. She's beautiful.

"Different people," my wife says. I agree.

Fastforward. We are inside the hall. Our seats in the Loge.



The lights go first, music, the people stand, cheer abound is thunderous, and Benigni gets on stage. It's strange, like he is a rock star. The energy is for a rock show. Screams from the groupies. Perhaps the man would show some difference? He's short, skinny, balding, in slacks.

Benigni begins a stand-up routine in English, with a heavy Italian accent. He's funny. It's hard to understand a few words, but, his jokes come through. He says he can say anything because it's English, and in English no one can understand him. He tells a story about cocaine found in the sewers, more cocaine than what is shipped in total to England. This explain why there are no cats in his city. If the rats had that much coke. . .

Benigni talks about Burlusconi and translation. Somehow he is able to relate translation to real good coffee. On to the translation of Dante. Translation of poetry. Translation of the meaning of poetry. Translation of the poet. The translation of translation.

Ok. Here is the meat of the meat:

Benigni gave us the fifth canto of Dante's Inferno. Check it out here if you're interested in how much text that is. He walked us through each line.

With the English translation projected on a screen overhead, he gave us the context behind each line. What was going on in Italy at the time. Did you know, it was during Dante's time that Purgatory was 'discovered'? Did you know, it was the literature of Dante and others that set the foundation for the modern Italian language we know today?

Do you care? You should. If you don't know what's in your world, you don't know what has agency in your life and things happen to you, rather than by you.

Then, Benigni stepped back and performed the whole thing in ancient Italian uninterrupted as a true scholar and Italian.

It was one of the most beautiful things I've heard. I will remember it for the rest of my life.

Now, here's a picture of the outside of the Davies Symphony Hall.