Eighteen months after Aeneas’s arrival in Italy.
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OVERTURE
There is a storm.
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Aeneas meets Dido in the underworld. He beckons to her but she turns away without
word.
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ACT 1: THE SHORE, TROIA NOVA
Aeneas and his son Ascanius are walking by the shore where they find a woman,
narrowly escaped from drowning. Aeneas mistakes her for Dido, but it is her sister Anna who explains how she has come to wash up on their shore, a refugee.  
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Aeneas offers her the comfort of his palace and sends Ascanius on with news of their
imminent arrival.
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ACT 2: THE PALACE, LAVINIUM
The court welcomes Anna. The chorus sings of the founding of the new kingdom in
Italy, and introduce Lavinia, Aeneas’s wife. Aeneas asks his queen to welcome Anna as a sister, but Lavinia is wary, knowing Dido’s hold on her husband’s heart.
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At the banquet, talk turns to the past. Aeneas tells of the mythic world to which he and Anna belonged. His was a divine mission; now the Gods are silent and there is nothing left for him.  
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Lavinia is disquieted. As rumour flies around the table, Juno possesses her with
jealousy as Anna tells the true story of Dido’s death. Lavinia presents an entertainment: a performance of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas that soon exercises a supernatural hold over its audience.
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Belinda (the Spirit of the Theatre) beckons Anna onstage to assume the role of “Dido”.
When Aeneas becomes “Aeneas”, they act out their love story, a manifestation of
Lavinia’s greatest fears that she is condemned to watch from the audience. As her
thoughts turn murderous, she plots with Elymas, her spy.
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Encouraged by the Sorceress, who directs his performance exclusively to Lavinia,
goading her on, the Queen herself steps into the drama as the Spirit of the Sorceress
to give Aeneas his instructions to leave Dido. Aeneas is left alone onstage as
performance and real life melt into each other. The sailors enter to bring him back to
his senses, to persuade him to leave on his mission.
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As Anna sleeps, the Sorceress, the Spirit and witches revel in her destruction and exit
triumphant. Anna wakes with a start: she dreamed that her sister’s ghost commanded
her to flee or face death at the hands of Lavinia. She takes flight.
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Dido’s Ghost appears to a terrified Aeneas, who assumes she is there for revenge on
him. But the ghost tells Aeneas she is there only to save her sister, who has run to the
river Numicus. If he assures Anna’s safe passage, she will lift her curse on the Trojan
race. Aeneas begs the Ghost to stay, but she leaves him. He has one final mission.
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There is a disturbance: Lavinia and her henchmen discover that Anna has fled. Guards
leave to hunt her down, but Aeneas breaks Lavinia’s spell, explaining that she has been possessed by jealousy just as Dido was once possessed by love.  
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The chase is on.
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ACT 3: THE RIVER NUMICUS
Anna’s footprints disappear by the river. Has she drowned? Aeneas assumes she has
tried to swim across and, commanding the guards to return to the palace, prays for a
sign to reveal her fate.
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At this, the river stops flowing. Anna, reunited with Dido, rises from its depths. The
river Numicus has offered them safe harbour in its sacred stream. They are Gods now,
eternally entwined as one, immortal.  
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Aeneas is left alone onstage; the curse on the Trojan race is lifted, but facing the past
has cost him everything.
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©Wesley Stace
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Emmanuel Music and the Creative Team for Dido’s Ghost would like to express appreciation and thanks to: Joan Margot Smith and Bill Nigreen & Kathleen McDermott for hosting our artists; to Peter Wender for sponsoring student tickets; to Emmanuel Church for their ongoing support of our residency; and to the MIT community for their tremendous help in making this project possible.