Gilbert of Gilbert & Sullivan: His Life and Character
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'[W.S. Gilbert] had a keen eye for the foibles and eccentricities of his countrymen and their institutions. Andrew Crowther movingly describes the effects of Gilbert's unhappy childhood on his character and the way that he found escape and release in the fairy tale world of pantomime. He is particularly informative on the genesis of Iolanthe, perhaps the most biting and successful piece of social and political satire in the Savoy canon. Loudly let the trumpet bray!' - Ian Bradley, the author of The Complete Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan 'A sympathetic and illuminating portrait of a quintessential Englishman' - Ian Bradley
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"A sympathetic and illuminating portrait of a quintessential Englishman". (Ian Bradley). The author of "The Pirates of Penzance", "The Mikado", "H.M.S. Pinafore" and the other great Savoy libretti, W.S. Gilbert was witty, caustic and disrespectful, one of the celebrities of the late Victorian era. He wrote the most brilliantly inventive plays of his time, and with Arthur Sullivan he wrote comic operas that defined the age. He became richer and more famous than he could have imagined, but at the price of his artistic freedom. In his time Gilbert had been many things: journalist, theatre critic, cartoonist, comic poet, stage director, writer of short stories, dramatist. Andrew Crowther examines W.S. Gilbert from all these angles, using a wealth of sources to tell the story of an angry and quarrelsome man, discontented with himself and the age he lived in, raging at life's absurdities and laughing at them. In this book Gilbert's glorious, contradictory character is explored and brought vividly to life.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I am very taken with this biography of WS Gilbert written, I presume, to coincide with the centenary of his death. I am glad about this because there is very little else around to remind us of the fact.
Andrew Crowther loves his subject but does not tarry over details, instead keeping the pace brisk and fresh. I have read numerous books on the subject but never before has Gilbert's personality been so clearly brought to life for me. Using the lightest of touches, the author manages to show us that Gilbert was, like Ralph Rackstraw, 'a living ganglion of irreconcilable antagonisms'.
There are many interesting new snippets to add to the familiar events and bons mots. In particular, I was fascinated by the chapter on Gilbert's plot book for Iolanthe and how the opera seemed to take its familiar form comparatively late in the creative process. I had not known that the house we all know as Grim's Dyke had been previously known as Graeme's Dyke until Gilbert renamed it. Extraordinary that it cost only £30,000, even then. I had not heard Gilbert's retort before that he could justify flirting with young would-be actresses in The Flirtorium because he was 'too good to be true' to his wife, Lucy!
One tiny observation: Mr Crowther says that Mrs Howard Paul was 'edged out' of the first production of HMS Pinafore. My understanding has always been that she was taken very seriously ill and died not long after the First Night? It is interesting to speculate how the rest of the Savoy Operas might have developed had there continued to be two elderly ugly ladies rather than the usual one?! Gilbert was, after all, very loyal to his regular team at the Opera Comique and then the Savoy.
All in all, then, a very welcome addition to the bibliography of Gilbert, the Savoy canon and, it is worth adding, theatrical life in the second half of nineteenth century London.
Andrew Crowther loves his subject but does not tarry over details, instead keeping the pace brisk and fresh. I have read numerous books on the subject but never before has Gilbert's personality been so clearly brought to life for me. Using the lightest of touches, the author manages to show us that Gilbert was, like Ralph Rackstraw, 'a living ganglion of irreconcilable antagonisms'.
There are many interesting new snippets to add to the familiar events and bons mots. In particular, I was fascinated by the chapter on Gilbert's plot book for Iolanthe and how the opera seemed to take its familiar form comparatively late in the creative process. I had not known that the house we all know as Grim's Dyke had been previously known as Graeme's Dyke until Gilbert renamed it. Extraordinary that it cost only £30,000, even then. I had not heard Gilbert's retort before that he could justify flirting with young would-be actresses in The Flirtorium because he was 'too good to be true' to his wife, Lucy!
One tiny observation: Mr Crowther says that Mrs Howard Paul was 'edged out' of the first production of HMS Pinafore. My understanding has always been that she was taken very seriously ill and died not long after the First Night? It is interesting to speculate how the rest of the Savoy Operas might have developed had there continued to be two elderly ugly ladies rather than the usual one?! Gilbert was, after all, very loyal to his regular team at the Opera Comique and then the Savoy.
All in all, then, a very welcome addition to the bibliography of Gilbert, the Savoy canon and, it is worth adding, theatrical life in the second half of nineteenth century London.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
1 review
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
The Best Gilbert Biography of Them All
13 Jan 2012
Format:Hardcover
Andrew Crowther has devoted much of his life to the study of W.S. Gilbert and qualifies as the leading Gilbertian expert of our time. This biography is his masterwork, and it's a tremendous accomplishment. Most biographies of Gilbert are little more than a list of dates, incidents, statistics, with various well-known anecdotes thrown in. Crowther has a more ambitious goal: the re-creation of the personality of this complicated man, who at once was the funniest man in Victorian England and the most infuriating human being on the planet. Gilbert wrote and directed the most delightful comic operettas ever known, while denigrating them at the same time as they made his fortune. To be Gilbert's friend or coworker, Crowther demonstrates, was also to subject yourself to the constant possibility of a quarrel (and not infrequently, a lawsuit). But, having made it clear what a troubled and troubling man Gilbert was, Crowther then takes care to demonstrate that Gilbert could be loving, generous, and compassionate in other settings. From Gilbert's kidnapping as a small child to his heroic death while rescuing a drowning woman, this biography gives us a Gilbert who is a real human being. None of Gilbert's other biographers have done that. Anyone interested in getting to know what William Gilbert was really like should start here.
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