Inkle and Yarico is a comic opera

Comic opera

Comic opera denotes a sung dramatic work of a light or comic nature, usually with a happy ending.Forms of comic opera first developed in late 17th-century Italy. By the 1730s, a new operatic genre, opera buffa, emerged as an alternative to opera seria...

 first staged in London, England in August 1787, with music by Samuel Arnold

Samuel Arnold (composer)

Samuel Arnold was an English composer and organist.Arnold was born in London , and began writing music for the theatre in about 1764. A few years later he became director of music at the Marylebone Gardens, for which much of his popular music was written...

 and a libretto

Libretto

A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...

 by George Colman the Younger

George Colman the Younger

George Colman , known as "the Younger", English dramatist and miscellaneous writer, was the son of George Colman "the Elder".-Life:...

.

The opera was highly successful, performed 98 times at the Haymarket Theatre

Haymarket Theatre

The Theatre Royal Haymarket is a West End theatre in the Haymarket in the City of Westminster which dates back to 1720, making it the third-oldest London playhouse still in use...

, and a total of 164 performances on London stages by 1800. One of the most famous actresses to play the part of Yarico was Elizabeth Satchell

Elizabeth Satchell

Elizabeth Kemble was a British actress.-Life:She was born in London, and she was a talented performer when she married Stephen Kemble, of the Kemble family, in 1783. They acted together for several years both in London and in the provincial circuits. She outlived him by 19 years...

. There were also performances in Dublin (1787), Jamaica (1788), New York (1789), Philadelphia (1790), Calcutta (1791), and Boston (1794).

Plot

Inkle, an English trader, is shipwrecked in the West Indies, and survives with the help of Yarico, an Indian maiden. They fall in love, but when Inkle returns to his civilization, he plans to sell Yarico into slavery

Atlantic slave trade

The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the trans-atlantic slave trade, refers to the trade in slaves that took place across the Atlantic ocean from the sixteenth through to the nineteenth centuries...

 to recover his financial losses while he marries a woman, Narcissa, who will give him the social standing he wants. In the end, Inkle repents and marries the faithful Yarico.

Origins

The supposedly true story first appeared in Richard Ligon

Richard Ligon

Richard Ligon , a British author, lost his fortune in the troubles of 1647, and during this turbulent time in England he found himself, as he notes in his narrative, a "stranger in my own country." On June 14, 1647, he left for Barbadoes to gain his fortune in the New World, like many of his fellow...

's book A True and Exact History of the Island of Barbadoes (1657).

Richard Steele's Spectator

The Spectator

The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...

printed another version in March 1711, in which Yarico is a Native American

Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...

, sold into slavery while bearing Inkle's child.

Modern Revival

"Inkle and Yarico" only survives in vocal score, and in 1996 composer Roxanna Panufnik was commissioned by the Holders Opera Festival, Barbados, to recompose the opera for modern symphony orchestra and steel pan. The production premiered at the festival on 15th March 1997, featuring the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra with British soloist Rachel Hayward performing the solo pan part.
Composer James McConnel was commissioned to compose a score for 'Inkle'n Yarico' in 1997, and was performed at the 1999 Edinburgh Festival.

External links

• excerpt from Linda V. Troost's The Rise of the Comic Opera
• Original 1711 Spectator text
• Roxanna Panufnik's official website