DONALD Trump’s proposals to take over the Panama Canal, Greenland and Canada have been greeted with widespread incredulity but a 19th-century Scot showed similar audaciousness by inventing an entire country.
Gregor MacGregor’s actions had serious consequences with 150 people dying as a result.
For those who do not see the ugly truth of Scottish involvement in the British Empire, the story of MacGregor is a thundering wake-up call and has been turned into a new production by playwright Liam Rees.
MacGregor called his territory Poyais and started to sell plots, feeding on the desire of many in the British Isles to find fortune in far-off lands.
Hundreds signed up to emigrate and in 1822, two ships set off from London and Leith, stuffed with passengers who had lapped up MacGregor’s lies of a promised land.
Instead of riches, however, they found only infertile land and disease. A total of 150 people died out of the 250 people who first set sail, many of them Scots.
MacGregor fled to France where, incredibly, he tried to relaunch the scam but word had spread and he was arrested and charged with fraud. Somehow, he managed to talk his way to freedom and later sailed back to Venezuela where he died in 1845.
Rees (below) said he was inspired to write the play when he came across MacGregor’s story and saw the parallels with today’s fraudsters, charlatans and grifters.
“MacGregor’s story felt very relevant to what we are living through now in terms of living in a post-truth society and being bombarded with propaganda.”
Rees added that MacGregor’s false claims about Poyais were echoed by some of the rhetoric deployed by President Trump, particularly his plans to annex the Panama Canal, Canada and Greenland.
Trump has also threatened the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.
“It’s easy to think we are living in unprecedented times but we are not,” said Rees. “We have dealt with charlatans in the past and we will continue to deal with them. It is quite comforting to know we are not actually alone.”
MacGregor’s story also serves as a lesson to those who think Scotland did not play a willing part in the expansion of the British Empire, Rees said.
“It really cuts to the heart of a kind of mythology that I have seen in Scotland which is that Scotland is some kind of perfect victim of British imperialism and never wanted anything to do with colonisation,” he added.
“I saw this narrative in a lot of independence groups but we can’t whitewash our own history if we want to make a new future.
We would love to erase a lot of history and I think MacGregor’s story has been wilfully forgotten because it does not paint Scotland in the best light.”
At the same time, MacGregor’s story made Rees think about the kind of country he would want to live in if it were possible to just start again.
“What if the guy actually thought he was going to make something new?” asked Rees. “What would it take to make something new, to try and do things differently?
“In a way, the play deconstructs how rhetorical devices can be used for harm to scam a lot of people but can also be reappropriated to inspire something hopeful. That is a big strand that comes through.”
He also sees parallels between the fiction of Poyais and the tourist image of Edinburgh where he previously worked as a tour guide. Rees said he was struck by how much the city was becoming a parody of itself.
“It often feels like there are two versions of the city – the city we live in and the city designed for tourists and I find that tension really interesting,” he said.
“Tourists see a very tailor-made version of the city but it is a marketing scheme designed for them and if you are living there, it is totally different.
“You have a housing crisis from homes being used for tourists and local people are being pushed further and further out. It does make you question why the culture has been built up to make it attractive and then the people that make the culture get pushed out.
“I’m interested in the commodification of culture and Scotland’s role as somewhere that has done that to other places and then done it to itself.”
The play receives its premiere in Edinburgh next month but has already impressed London audiences in a couple of test runs.
“I hope it is provocative, informative and funny and that it inspires audiences to question what they believe and why,” said Rees.
The Land That Never Was is at The Studio at Festival Theatre, Edinburgh on March 14 and Tron Theatre, Glasgow on March 21 and 22.
