Ye Highlands and Ye Lowlands

by Colin Ure, Houston Grand Opera Dramaturg

“Who comes from the bridal chamber?
It is Azrael, the angel of death.”
— Robert Southey, poet and friend of Sir Walter Scott

The border country of Lowland Scotland provides the backdrop for Gaetano Donizetti’s great bel canto opera Lucia di Lammermoor (1835) which is based on the romantic novel, The Bride of Lammermoor (1819) by the Scottish author and poet, Sir Walter Scott. Composers and their librettists are notorious for misrepresenting history, so what inspired Scott to write his story? Does Lucia di Lammermoor portray an accurate picture of Scotland? What has inspired the Scottish director, John Doyle, for his new production?

Scotland, the country of my birth, is an ancient and magical land whose natural beauty is overwhelming. The Scots are a proud people, a nation born out of the country’s turbulent history and a romantic folklore rich with dramatic legends and heroic characters. Through the exploits of brutal freedom fighters like William Wallace and Robert the Bruce, the country became a kingdom ruled by the mighty Stuart dynasty, who for centuries led the Scots into battle against their “auld enemy,” the English. Scotland embraced the Protestant Reformation which swept across Europe in the sixteenth century, its struggle against the “evils of Popery” leading to religious internecine feuds which continue today. In 1603, the unthinkable happened when, for religious and political reasons, King James VI of Scotland ascended the English throne, and after centuries of bitter struggle, a Stuart monarch ruled the kingdoms of Scotland and England. The Scots’ euphoria was short-lived; James VI and his Stuart descendants found the lure of London more appealing than Edinburgh, the windswept Scottish capital, and became absentee monarchs in the process.

Throughout the seventeenth century the struggle between absolute monarchy and the power of the people resulted in civil strife in both Scotland and England. The Stuart king Charles I, a Catholic, lost both his throne and his head in 1649. The “Glorious Revolution” or “Protestant wind” of 1688 secured the throne for the Protestant regents Mary Stuart and her Dutch husband, William of Orange, followed by the Act of Settlement in 1701, and the Treaty of Union six years later, which not only united the countries of Scotland, England, and Wales into Great Britain, but finally secured a Protestant monarchy.

When William and Mary’s successor, Queen Anne, died in 1714 — her seventeen children having predeceased her — the crown passed to her nearest Protestant relative, the German prince, George, the Elector of Hanover. Once again Scotland was plunged into violent strife, the chiefs of many of the Highland clans who were staunch Catholics supporting Stuart princes exiled in France because of their religion. What followed were several Jacobite rebellions, which reached their tragic conclusions at the Battle of Culloden in 1746, the last pitched battle on British soil, where the Hanoverian army, bolstered by Scottish clans loyal to the Crown, routed the Highland army of Charles Edward Stuart, or “Bonnie Prince Charlie.” Following the battle, the Crown wrought terrible revenge on the Highlanders, resulting in executions, transportations, mass emigration to North America and the colonies, and the virtual destruction of the Highland way of life.

Sir Walter Scott was the first English-language novelist and poet to become internationally acclaimed in his own lifetime. His romantic novels which were written between 1814 and 1832 were read by Kings and commoners alike, and created a romantic world of heroes and heroines whose stories transported their readers from the harsh realities of the times. He was a committed monarchist, an avid collector of all things Scottish, the man more or less responsible for putting today’s plethora of gaudy tartans on the Scottish map. Although he made his fortune from the sale of his novels, unlike his contemporary, the poet Robert Burns, he was definitely not a “man of the people.” His horror and revulsion to the ideals of the French Revolution and its aftermath, strengthened his belief that the  “common man” should know his place and remain disenfranchised.

The Bride of Lammermoor, or Lammermuir in the Scots language, takes place during the reign of Queen Anne (1702–14), a tumultuous time for Scotland. The sun was setting on the Stuart dynasty; the House of Hanover had become part of the royal succession, creating the threat of rebellion, and the Scottish and English parliaments had united under the flag of Great Britain. Scott insisted that his inspiration came from real life events surrounding the Dalrymple family, whose daughter, Janet, was betrothed against her will to the heir of the affluent Dunbar family. Janet loved the penniless Archibald Rutherford, but assented to marry Dunbar out of duty and familial loyalty. On the evening of their wedding Dunbar was found drenched in blood and close to death in their bedchamber while Janet stood nearby clutching a bloody dagger. Janet, who lost her reason, died shortly afterwards. There is still conjecture as to the actual events in the bedchamber. Did Janet stab Dunbar, or did Rutherford lie in wait for him? Or, as others have speculated, in a society controlled by a repressive religion, like all repressive religions based on guilt and fear, was it the Devil who attacked Dunbar and then tormented Janet to death?

It can be argued that Scotland is as irrelevant to Lucia di Lammermoor as it is to Verdi’s Macbeth, as both operas focus on emotional relationships which could take place anywhere. Donizetti and his librettist, Salvatore Cammarano, were clearly ignorant of Scottish history of the period and seemed to ignore the historical events in Scott’s novel. They create a tenuous link between Edgardo and the Jacobite cause portrayed by his departure for France at the end of Act One, and completely rewrite British history with their reference to King William and Queen Mary being of opposing political and religious factions.

John Doyle and I were brought up among some of Scotland’s most beautiful and majestic scenery. However, the landscape in his production is far more bleak and austere, befitting the brutality of the story. Here is a male-dominated society, a mafia-style culture in which strong, matriarchal figures exist, but the social order is nevertheless ruled by men. Visually the landscape is not a romantic depiction of Scotland as seen in paintings by artists such as Landseer, and the abstract nature of the set designs allows Doyle to explore the desolation of its setting. Elizabeth Ascroft’s sets, resembling hard blocks of grey granite stone, permit a degree of fluidity in their movement, allowing Doyle to contrast open spaces with claustrophobic interiors, in which the tragedy of Lucia, a lone woman, unfolds. The sets also represent Lucia’s troubled state of mind, and can portray masculinity, femininity, and sexuality as well.

The great “mad scene” that dominates the opera is a wonderful review of Lucia’s troubled journey through life, portrayed through Donizetti’s music. What Doyle finds fascinating about this scene is that it takes place in public, in front of family and friends. Doyle’s production portrays Lucia’s emotional explosion in the midst of a constrictive—almost repressive—society, showing emotions which the Scots as a nation would keep deep within their psyche, and firmly under control. The tragedy of the opera is that Lucia has to descend into madness in order to find a release from the society in which she lives.

Colin Ure is HGO’s resident Dramaturg and a frequent contributor to Opera Cues magazine.