It was a chance discovery that led to Benjamin Britten writing Peter Grimes, his first opera and the work that sealed his international reputation.
Living in effective exile in the United States, Britten happened upon a copy of George Crabbe’s 1810 collection of poems, The Borough, set in the bleak coastal environment of eastern England where the composer had grown up. A mix of homesickness coupled with a personal identification with the sense of alienation felt by Crabbe's Grimes compelled Britten to create a full-scale musical exposition based on the character.
Premiered at Sadler’s Wells in London on 7 June 1945, Britten’s opera pits its eponymous antihero against the community he lives in. A fisherman, who has already seen one of the town’s boys drown on his watch, arouses suspicion when he seeks to recruit another. When his new apprentice dies in a freak accident, the Borough’s men round on him with only Ellen, its schoolmistress, prepared to come to his defence.
