Poetry
Il-Jien u lil hinn minnu
Not translated into English
Dun Karm · 1938
Synopsis
A poem that the author subtitles “song of the mind, the heart and the soul”. In it the poet questions his spiritual experience and seeks to come to terms with a God whose silence is the ultimate test of faith; in solitude, he meditates on human existence and on a God of hidden power, whom man can only accept without explaining.
Context
Written between 1936 and 1938, the poem appeared in 1938. Oliver Friggieri produced an annotated edition of it in 1988, whose introduction sees it rising above everything contingent and giving Maltese literature a matured form. Laurent Ropa translated it into French and Carmel Mallia into Esperanto; it has been given an existentialist reading, and the Maltese body responsible for books offered its text online in 2018.
Who it is for
For reading the masterwork of Malta's national poet, a meditation on God and solitude.
Prizes and reception
The National Book Council ranks it among the finest works of Maltese literature, and holds it to be its author's best.