Gilbert and Sullivan by John W. Barker

Now, as is so often the case with a pair of collaborators (e.g., opera composers and their librettists), each one had a distinct career of his own, both before and after the period of collaboration (if not also during). Yet, as with few other great collaborations, the totality was more than merely a sum of its two parts. As much as we may respect what each did separately, it was only in working together that each did his most memorable work. That special aptness of their matched talents has made them seem all but joined at the hip for eternity as “Gilbertandsullivan” or “G & S”. Yet, their separate as well as their joint activities require consideration if we are to appreciate their legacy.

Gilbert before Sullivan:

From my earliest childhood the ridiculous has thrust itself into every action of my life. I have been haunted through my whole existence by the absurd.
--- William Gilbert (father of W.S.), Memoirs of a Cynic

William Schwenck Gilbert was born in 1836. He was one of four children, and the only son of a naval officer, William Gilbert (1804-1890); and, indeed, matters maritime seem to have been in the future dramatist’s blood from the start-he claimed (on no firm evidence) as one of his paternal ancestors Sir Humphrey Gilbert, one of Elizabeth I’s great sea captains, and founder of the early English colony in Newfoundland (1583). The baby was given the second name of Schwenck after his godmother, a name by which his family often addressed him.

William Gilbert Senior had inherited a substantial fortune and retired at age twenty-five to pursue a range of interests including social issues and abnormal psychology as well as theater and opera. He produced a large number of books though, curiously, he did not begin actual publication until his son had begun to achieve some literary attention in his own late twenties. The elder Gilbert wrote widely, including several multi-volume novels. (To several of his books his talented son contributed original illustrations.) His style was turgid and his expression burdened with fiercely held opinions and prejudices, including a fervent hatred of Roman Catholicism. He had a fierce temper and eccentric ways-which are, in fact, accurately portrayed in one episode of Topsy-Turvy. His parents’ turbulent marriage and eventual separation had made for a very unhappy domestic environment.

The young William Schwenck Gilbert seemed fated to be gathering material for his stage plots from infancy. His parents brought him on numerous travels: at age two he was along for a journey to Naples where a pair of local con-men tricked his nursemaid into giving the lad into their care; thus abducted, he was held for ransom (twenty-five pounds, a good sum for the day). Absent-minded nursemaids and mishandled babies would turn up in several of the operettas to come.

After some early schooling in France, he was sent in his teens to study in the Great Ealing School, trainer of many an eminent Victorian. It was in this period that he began writing plays for student use. Going on to King’s College, London, he published verses in the school magazine. The raging of the Crimean War prompted him to study for examinations that would lead to a military commission, but the sudden end of that war terminated that direction. As an alternative to professional military service, Gilbert did serve for upwards of twenty years in militia units, eventually of the Gordon or Royal Aberdeenshire Highlanders-which allowed him to sport about in kilts, perfect his proficiency at the Highland reel, and obtain a reputation as a great wit and jokester. Such military experience produced a curious dichotomy in him: on the one hand a keen awareness of the posturings of military life and authority, while on the other a delight in the swagger of military display.