Teatru Manoel is soon set to raise the curtain on Dido and Aeneas as this year’s beloved annual opera – and Malta’s historic national theatre has overcome all odds to bring it to the stage. Laura Bonnici finds out more. A tragic tale of love and loss, royalty and witches, stormy seas and magical misdirection. Although this sounds like the makings of a modern hit movie, in fact, this dramatic story thrilled its first audiences on stage more than 300 years ago. Such are the universal and timeless themes of Dido and Aeneas, the first – and ultimately, the only – opera written by great English Baroque composer Henry Purcell, based on a libretto by Nahum Tate. The opera was inspired by book IV of Virgil’s poem The Aeneid, with Purcell translating both the epic tale and its deeper ideas regarding death and deception for a then-contemporary audience.