What happens when an architect turned director takes over TS Eliot barren land? Eliot’s fragmentary poetry is transformed into a living canvas on stage. Axel Tangerding, founder of Meta Theater Munich, does exactly that. Known for bringing his architectural sensibilities to the theatre, he treats the stage not as a backdrop but as an environment: a white square, covered in plaster, “is prepared anew for each performance”, then broken down layer by layer to reveal what lies beneath. “It’s like looking beneath the surface,” he explains on a call from Germany. “In a time of fake news and fragmented realities, theater must ask what is credible, what comes across.”
Director Axel Tangerding will also be on stage. Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
barren landPresented by Jagriti Theater in collaboration with Meta Theatre, to be staged in Bengaluru from July 30 to August 2 at 7.30 pm, featuring actor Nicole Klein, with live music composed and performed by Ardh English, the production transforms Eliot’s verses into an intense theatrical experience.
“Eliot’s text itself transcends cultures – quoting Shakespeare, Wagner and even the Upanishads in its concluding lines with Shantih Shantih Shantih – weaving fragments across the centuries, from antiquity to modernity”axel tangerding
Eliot’s poem written in 1922 still reminds us. Even a century later, its verses continue to echo devastation, uncertainty and disillusionment. To adapt this text, Axel began to use excerpts from the poem for librettos in musical theatre. In 2022, marking its centenary, he staged the full text as a reading with Meta Theater and was amazed by the public response. “The readings were repeated, then expanded with music, later with lyrics, until a structure gradually emerged. It was a gradual process,” he recalls. “I had not thought about turning it into a play. But there was so much enthusiasm in the audience that we decided to do so. With this poem, Eliot broke all conventions. It has no rhyme or fixed syllables. That is why it is called the first poem of modern literature. For my generation, it was a milestone. We were also rebelling against old theater traditions, opening up the stage as a laboratory.”
Music is composed by Aadhi English. Photo credit: Courtesy: Peter Hinz-Rosin
Axel says that Meta Theater is influenced by La Mama Theater in New York and Jerzy Grotowski in Poland. Both were pioneers of what we now call avant-garde theatre, and focused on the basics of performance. “I felt barren land works in a similar way,” he explains, “and I compare it to Jim Jarmusch only lovers Left Alive (2013), which zooms into positions and then moves to the next position. The effect is emotional rather than logical – not a linear continuity, but a coherence that exists between the lines.
Axel brings an architectural sensibility to the stage. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
“Eliot’s text itself transcends cultures – quoting Shakespeare, Wagner and even the Upanishads in its closing lines Shanti: Shanti: Shanti: – “Weaving together the fragments of the centuries, from antiquity to modernity,” the fragmented presence of poetry echoes across the centuries – from two thousand years ago to the present day.
pieces that fit together
The Waste Land, first published in the UK in 1922, received a mixed response and some even called it ‘PTSD poetry’.
The main theme of the poem is the spiritual, cultural and emotional barrenness of the modern world.
It is considered one of the most influential works of the 20th century and a foundational work of modernism.
The poem is divided into five sections. In today’s disruptive and alienating world, youth find resonance in their fragmented voices.
He finds that their mood is torn between depression and hope for a better future. “That tension is there in Eliot’s text too – between despair after the First World War and a longing for renewal,” says Axel, an admirer of Peter Brook. For him, Brooks’s radical experiments in theater opened up new ways of thinking about performance, and Eliot’s poetry, with its broken sounds and cultural leaps, continues that tradition of disruption.
The play in English will be staged at Jagruti Theater in Whitefield, Bengaluru from July 31 to August 2 at 7.30 pm, tickets on BookMyShow.
published – July 27, 2026 05:37 PM IST