Montagu Slater new. Slater's original libretto, which he published himself (to the annoyance of Britten and Peter Pears, who had made a number of amendments to it before the opera was staged), is cast in three acts. It omits the repetitions necessary in the actual opera. Anthony Burgess, writing in The Listener (magazine) in 1964, stated: “The excellence of Peter Grimes has a great deal to do with Montagu Slater's libretto, the only libretto I know that can be read in its own right as a dramatic poem.” He also wrote the libretti for `Yerma’, composed by Denis Aplvor. Slater was involved,
Peter Grimes cliff to his boat, but to no avail: the boy falls to his death. When the mob reaches the hut Grimes is gone, and they find nothing out of order, so they disperse. The same, two days later, night time in the Borough ("Moonlight" in the "Sea Interludes"). While a dance is going on, Mrs Sedley tries to convince the authorities that Grimes is a murderer, but to no avail. Ellen and Captain Balstrode confide in each other: Grimes has disappeared, and Balstrode has discovered a jersey washed ashore: a jersey that Ellen recognises as one she had knitted for