Browse Items (242 total)

First night program for W. S. Gilbert's musical extravaganza The Pretty Druidess; or, the Mother, the Maid and the Mistletoe Bough at the Charing Cross Theatre, London. The program also included the operatic sketch Coming of Age (music by E. L.…

Souvenir fan commemorating the opening of the Gaiety Theatre, 21 December 1868, under the management of John Hollingshead. Gilbert’s operatic extravaganza Robert the Devil (here spelt Robert le Diable) received its first performance at the Gaiety’s…

First edition libretto of W. S. Gilbert's extravaganza Dulcamara; or, The Little Duck and the Great Quack. Gilbert’s first acknowledged stage work, Dulcamara was a burlesque of Donizetti’s opera L’Elisir d’Amore. It was produced at the St. James’s…

Portrait photograph of seated W. S. Gilbert by Fradelle & Marshall, London. Matted and framed, signed on the matte by Gilbert.

This composition was published as a tribute to the comic magazine Fun, to which W. S. Gilbert was a leading contributor from 1861 to 1871. The figure in cap and bells (lower right) represents the magazine’s prominent rival, Punch.

Four volumes of stories, poems, cartoons, and puzzles, each containing several contributions by W. S. Gilbert. The Annual for 1873 also includes a story by Mark Twain. The volume is displayed open to Gilbert's two-page cartoon "Mr. Peters Takes a…

Volume of stories, poems, cartoons, burlesques, puzzles, containing several contributions by W. S. Gilbert, including the burlesque Ruy Blas, the cartoon The History of the Gentleman Who was Born at an Advanced Age, and a chapter of The 5 Alls titled…

Order of Service for the funeral of Sir Arthur Sullivan at the Chapel Royal, St. James's Palace. Last page deals with interment at St. Paul’s Cathedral and includes four stanzas of Sullivan’s anthem “Brother, thou art gone before us,” from The…

Portrait photograph of Arthur Sullivan, on photographer's card mount by Chancellor, Dublin

Four pages of facsimile music manuscript for the song "The Absent-Minded Beggar" in decorative cover, with photographs of Arthur Sullivan and Rudyard Kipling.