Peter Grimes or ambiguous the various characters are. Pears was certainly the intended Peter Grimes, and it is likely that Britten wrote the role of Ellen Orford for Joan Cross. The work has been called "a powerful allegory of homosexual oppression", and one of "the true operatic masterpieces of the 20th century", but the composer's own contemporary (1948) summation of the work was simpler: a subject very close to my heart — the struggle of the individual against the masses. The more vicious the society, the more vicious the individual. Though as the writing of the libretto progressed, certain versions showed Grimes'
Murder of the Grimes sisters [to affix blame onto] Bedwell or Barry Cook." Lorretta Grimes would remain adamant until her death this caller had been the same individual who had contacted her in May 1957 and had revealed the deformity upon one of her daughters' feet which had never been released to the press or the public, stating: "I will never forget that voice." Charles Melquist was never charged with his alleged involvement in the deaths of the Grimes sisters. He died in 2010. Murder of the Grimes sisters The murder of the Grimes sisters is a currently unsolved double murder dating from December 1956