A Poem by Heart

Onstage, ten empty chairs of different sizes and materials—forming a semicircle—asked to be filled. In the middle, Portuguese director Tiago Rodrigues sat on a black stool with a book, reading and waiting for the audience to enter the house. He wore a white t-shirt with an image of poet Boris Pasternak in front and literary critic George Steiner on the back, whom he later quoted at length. In front of him stood three wooden crates full of books. The casual outfit and mundane objects presaged how Rodrigues later chafed at any claims of theatricality, in his promise that everything would be normal and calm during the performance. With this in mind, he invited ten volunteers from the audience to occupy the chairs and learn a poem by heart. The poem he had chosen, according to Rodrigues, was neither easy nor too difficult—it was something possible. The performance would begin only when the chairs were occupied, and end when all ten audience-participants recited the poem in full.