Creatures Of Impulse
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''Creatures of Impulse'' is a stage play by the English
dramatist A playwright or dramatist is a person who writes plays, which are a form of drama that primarily consists of dialogue between characters and is intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. Ben Jonson coined the term "playwri ...
W. S. Gilbert Sir William Schwenck Gilbert (18 November 1836 â€“ 29 May 1911) was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his collaboration with composer Arthur Sullivan, which produced fourteen comic operas. The most fam ...
, with music by the composer-conductor
Alberto Randegger Alberto Randegger (13 April 1832 – 18 December 1911) was an Italian-born composer, conductor and singing teacher, best known for promoting opera and new works of British music in England during the Victorian era and for his widely used textbook ...
, which Gilbert adapted from his own short story. Both the play and the short story concern an unwanted and ill-tempered old
fairy A fairy (also called fay, fae, fae folk, fey, fair folk, or faerie) is a type of mythical being or legendary creature, generally described as anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic, found in the folklore of multiple European cultures (including Cel ...
who enchants people to behave in a manner opposite to their natures, with
farcical Farce is a comedy that seeks to entertain an audience through situations that are highly exaggerated, extravagant, ridiculous, absurd, and improbable. Farce is also characterized by heavy use of physical humor; the use of deliberate absurdity o ...
results. The short story was written for ''
The Graphic ''The Graphic'' was a British weekly illustrated newspaper, first published on 4 December 1869 by William Luson Thomas's company, Illustrated Newspapers Ltd with Thomas's brother, Lewis Samuel Thomas, as a co-founder. The Graphic was set up as ...
'''s Christmas number of 1870, and the play was first produced at the
Court Theatre A court is an institution, often a government entity, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and administer justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance with the rule of law. Courts general ...
on 2 April 1871. It originally included six songs, but three were eventually cut, and some productions dispensed with the music entirely. While the lyrics survive, the music was never published and is lost. Reviews of the play were mostly positive, though it was criticised for the lack of a significant plot or superstructure to support its comic premise. Nonetheless, reviewers found it enjoyable, and it was a modest success, running for 91 performances and enjoying revivals into the early part of the 20th century. Gilbert had already written a considerable body of stories, plays, poems, criticism and other works before writing ''Creatures of Impulse''. He later wrote the
libretti A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major l ...
to the famous series of
Savoy operas Savoy opera was a style of comic opera that developed in Victorian England in the late 19th century, with W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan as the original and most successful practitioners. The name is derived from the Savoy Theatre, which imp ...
(composed by
Arthur Sullivan Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan (13 May 1842 â€“ 22 November 1900) was an English composer. He is best known for 14 comic opera, operatic Gilbert and Sullivan, collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including ''H.M.S. Pinaf ...
) between 1871 and 1896.


Background


Writer and composer

From the mid-1860s to the early 1870s,
W. S. Gilbert Sir William Schwenck Gilbert (18 November 1836 â€“ 29 May 1911) was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his collaboration with composer Arthur Sullivan, which produced fourteen comic operas. The most fam ...
was extremely productive, writing a large quantity of comic verse, theatre reviews and other journalistic pieces, short stories, and dozens of plays and comic operas. His output in 1870 included dozens of his popular comic ''
Bab Ballads ''The Bab Ballads'' is a collection of light verse by W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911), illustrated with his own comic drawings. The poems take their name from Gilbert’s childhood nickname. He later began to sign his illustrations "Bab". In wri ...
''; two blank verse comedies, '' The Princess'' and ''
The Palace of Truth ''The Palace of Truth'' is a three-act blank verse "Fairy Comedy" by W. S. Gilbert first produced at the Haymarket Theatre in London on 19 November 1870, adapted in significant part from Madame de Genlis's fairy story, ''Le Palais de la vérità ...
''; two comic operas, ''
Our Island Home ''Our Island Home'' is a one-act musical entertainment with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Thomas German Reed that premiered on 20 June 1870 at the Royal Gallery of Illustration. The piece has five characters and is "biographical", ...
'' and '' The Gentleman in Black''; and various other short stories, comic pieces, and reviews appearing in various periodicals and newspapers. In 1871 he was even busier, producing seven plays and operas. Gilbert's dramatic writing during this time was evolving from his early musical burlesques to a more restrained style, as exemplified in his string of blank-verse fairy comedies. The first of these was ''The Palace of Truth'', which opened in 1870 to widespread acclaim. He was also developing his unique style of absurdist humour, described as "Topsy-Turvy", made up of "a combination of wit, irony, topsyturvydom, parody, observation, theatrical technique, and profound intelligence". The story and play ''Creatures of Impulse'' date from the middle of this period, when Gilbert was trying different styles and working towards the mature style of his later work, including the famous series of
Gilbert and Sullivan Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900) and to the works they jointly created. The two men collaborated on fourteen com ...
operas. Gilbert described the play as a "musical fairytale".Gilbert (1911), p. 309. Italian-born
Alberto Randegger Alberto Randegger (13 April 1832 – 18 December 1911) was an Italian-born composer, conductor and singing teacher, best known for promoting opera and new works of British music in England during the Victorian era and for his widely used textbook ...
was better known as a conductor and professor of singing than as a composer, although he composed several full-length works and numerous vocal pieces in England in the 1860s and 1870s. He is also remembered for his important 1879 textbook entitled ''Singing''. His music for ''Creatures of Impulse'' was criticised as "extremely undramatic", though others found it "pretty". The score has been lost.


Genesis of story and play

Gilbert first published ''Creatures of Impulse'' as a short story, under the title "A Strange Old Lady", in the 1870 Christmas number of ''
The Graphic ''The Graphic'' was a British weekly illustrated newspaper, first published on 4 December 1869 by William Luson Thomas's company, Illustrated Newspapers Ltd with Thomas's brother, Lewis Samuel Thomas, as a co-founder. The Graphic was set up as ...
'', an illustrated weekly newspaper. He later selected it for inclusion in the only collection of his short stories published during his lifetime, '' Foggerty's Fairy and Other Tales'' (1890), at which point he renamed it to match the theatrical adaptation. Gilbert did not originally intend for the story to be turned into a play;Gilbert (1890), p. 5. nonetheless, a few months later it was on stage. He adapted the story into a play for
Marie Litton Marie Litton (7 May 1846 – 1 April 1884) was the stage name of Mary Jessie Lowe,Royal Court Theatre The Royal Court Theatre, at different times known as the Court Theatre, the New Chelsea Theatre, and the Belgravia Theatre, is a West End theatre#London's non-commercial theatres, non-commercial theatre in Sloane Square, London, England, opene ...
. Litton took over the proprietorship of the New Chelsea Theatre in 1871 and renamed it the Royal Court. Its opening attraction was the première of Gilbert's ''
Randall's Thumb ''Randall's Thumb'' is a play by W. S. Gilbert that premièred in 1871 at the opening of Marie Litton's Royal Court Theatre in London. Its plot, based on a short story that Gilbert had published the year before, relates how the forger Randall ...
'', and when that play proved successful, it was no surprise, as the ''London Echo'' pointed out, that she followed it with another work by Gilbert. He often used his previous prose work as the basis of later plays, and "The Strange Old Lady" was no exception. Under the new title of ''Creatures of Impulse'', it opened on 2 April 1871 as a companion piece for ''Randall's Thumb''. Successful, it lasted through 91 performances and acted as a companion piece to five different plays. Litton continued to commission works from Gilbert, including Gilbert's adaptation of
Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and Social criticism, social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by ...
' ''
Great Expectations ''Great Expectations'' is the thirteenth novel by English author Charles Dickens and his penultimate completed novel. The novel is a bildungsroman and depicts the education of an orphan nicknamed Pip. It is Dickens' second novel, after ''Dav ...
'' in 1871, ''
Broken Hearts ''Broken Hearts'' is a blank verse play by W. S. Gilbert in three acts styled "An entirely original fairy play". It opened at the Royal Court Theatre in London on 9 December 1875, running for three months, and toured the provinces in 1876. It w ...
'' in 1875, various translations of French works, and ''
The Happy Land ''The Happy Land'' is a play with music written in 1873 by W. S. Gilbert (under the pseudonym F. Latour Tomline) and Gilbert Arthur à Beckett. The musical play burlesques Gilbert's earlier play, '' The Wicked World''. The blank verse piece ...
'' in 1873, which portrayed members of the British Government on stage and caused such a scandal that it had an unusually long run.Meisel, pp. 278–300.


Subsequent productions and publications

The play was revived in 1872 at the Court Theatre, in 1873 at the Queen's Theatre, and in 1874 at the
Vaudeville Theatre The Vaudeville Theatre is a West End theatre on the Strand in the City of Westminster. Opening in 1870, the theatre staged mostly vaudeville shows and musical revues in its early days. The theatre was rebuilt twice, although each new buildin ...
(running for over 100 performances), all in London. It appears to have gone through several changes during these revivals, the first of which was described on its playbill as a "shortened version", and the last as an "altered" one. Various versions continued to be produced into the 20th century by amateurs as well as occasional professional groups, such as
Ben Greet Sir Philip Barling Greet (24 September 1857 – 17 May 1936), known professionally as Ben Greet, was a British William Shakespeare, Shakespearean actor, director, impresario and actor-manager. Early life The younger son of Captain William Gre ...
's Elizabethan Stage Society of England. An acting edition was published by T. H. Lacy around 1871.Allen, p. 13. T. H. Lacy was acquired by
Samuel French Samuel French (1821–1898) was an American entrepreneur who, together with British actor, playwright and theatrical manager Thomas Hailes Lacy, pioneered in the field of theatrical publishing and the licensing A license (American Englis ...
, and the libretto continued to be printed until about 1970. The piece, still occasionally produced, was part of the
International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival The International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival was founded in 1994 by Ian Smith and his son Neil and is held every summer in England. The two- or three-week Festival of Gilbert and Sullivan opera performances and fringe events attracts thousands ...
in 2006. It was presented by Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Victoria in Australia in 2024. Substantial cuts were made in the text by the time the play was collected for ''Original Plays, Fourth Series'' (1911), the last volume of the only large-scale collection of Gilbert's stage work. Victorian plays had to be approved by the
Lord Chamberlain The Lord Chamberlain of the Household is the most senior officer of the Royal Households of the United Kingdom, Royal Household of the United Kingdom, supervising the departments which support and provide advice to the Monarchy of the United Ki ...
for decency before they were performed, and the version submitted was then archived, providing a more-or-less complete collection of Victorian theatrical output, now part of the
British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...
. Comparison of the "licensing copy" of ''Creatures of Impulse'' from this archive with that printed in ''Original Plays'' reveals lyrics for three additional songs and a second verse to the opening chorus and finale.


Synopsis

''Note: The short story takes place at an inn on the road from London to
Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. It lies by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. The population of the Norwich ...
, but the play calls for Alsatian costumery. Otherwise, the plots of the short story and play are nearly identical. The summary below uses the names from the play and notes significant changes in plot between the play and short story.''Gilbert (1890), pp. 161–73.Gilbert (1911), pp. 309–27. ''There are also various small changes to the order of events, not described.'' At "The Three Pigeons" inn, it is a good day for some: the miser Boomblehardt has been out collecting rents from his tenants, and Sergeant Klooque, hero of
Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...
, has just arrived at the inn on leave and may now flirt with any lady he chooses, without the need to pretend they are his relatives to get around his tyrannical Colonel. However, it is not a good day for Martha, the landlady of the inn: staying there is a strange old lady, a mischievous fairy, who refuses to pay or to leave, and who needs neither food nor water. This is substantially cutting into Martha's profits. She enlists Boomblehardt and Klooque, the cowardly farmer Peter, and her extremely shy niece, Pipette, to help solve this problem. Peter, not cowardly enough to fear an old woman, nor superstitious enough to believe in her power, threatens the old fairy, trying to chase her away. Unfortunately, she does indeed have fairy powers and casts a spell that forces Peter to threaten anyone he encounters or, if alone, to fight imaginary enemies. Peter flees before he can get himself into trouble by threatening anyone bigger than him, calling out challenges as he goes. Sergeant Klooque approaches the old woman next and tries to use his military charm to win her over. It turns out that she hates soldiers, and she strikes out with her stick, making him duck and dodge. She then casts a spell to make his cringing, dodging and ducking permanent, intending that he lose his reputation and be branded a coward. Pipette arrives and watches his behaviour in astonishment. "He's showing you how he fought the enemy at Johannesburg,"Gilbert (1911), p. 321 exclaims the old lady, but he replies "No, my dear!" I'm showing you how the enemy fought us. This is the way they retreated". He leaves, cringing and pleading for imaginary attackers to stop as he goes. Pipette then tries to coax the old lady into leaving, kissing and hugging her, and appealing to her (hoped for) good nature. The old lady sees through her attempt, and in punishment for her "telling stories"Gilbert (1911), p. 322. compels her to kiss and cuddle all she meets. She cries out in protest that she's too shy for such behaviour, but the old lady assures her that she'll "get over ershyness after a year or two of that sort of thing". Boomblehardt approaches next, and Pipette flings herself on him, crying "Kiss me!". He obliges. She responds, "How dare you take such a liberty! You insolent old man! Kiss me". And so he does. She boxes his ears, much to his confusion, and then retreats into the inn in tears.Gilbert (1911), p. 323. Boomblehardt then meets with the old woman. The miser has heard that the strange old lady does not need to eat and offers to help her stay at the inn if she will teach him her secret of how to avoid wasting money on food. He offers her a golden guinea. The fairy decides that someone that miserly must be punished and compels him to continue passing out guineas to all he meets. Soon complications arise from these curses. Boomblehardt finds Sergeant Klooque's curse hilarious and decides that if he must give out money, the sergeant is as good as any other. The shy Pipette throws herself at Sergeant, who unwillingly ducks and dodges, trying to avoid her. When Peter arrives, he is forced to get into a fight with the sergeant over her, at which, to his surprise, the brave sergeant cowers, dodges, and ducks. Boomblehardt continues passing out guineas, his fortune dribbling away. Then Martha chases her customers out of the inn with a broom: She too has been cursed. Everyone has fallen under the fairy's ironic curses, forced to behave in a manner contrary to his or her intrinsic nature. Now the old lady makes her crucial mistake:Gilbert (1890), p. 172 makes it explicit that this is a tactical error on her part. She heads downstairs to check on her mischief, and the cursed group all run up to her to beg her to relent. They all behave as compelled by their curses: Peter threatens her, Pipette tries to kiss her, the sergeant ducks away from her, the miser offers her money, and the landlady keeps trying to chase her out with a broom. The chaos is overwhelming: "In short, the Old Lady, who was much more than a match for each of them taken singly, was overpowered by numbers". She is left with no choice but to relent, release the spells and leave, vanquished and embarrassed. The short story continues a bit further, making explicit some elements that are only hinted at in the play:
The really curious part of this story is that, after everything had been explained, and all had been restored to their normal courses of action, none of the personages involved in it married each other. They were all so annoyed at having made such fools of themselves that they walked out of the inn in different directions, and were never seen or heard of again. Except Peter, who, seeing nothing to be ashamed of in showing such undaunted courage, remained and kept the "Three Pigeons", and prospered remarkably to the end of his days.Gilbert (1890), p. 173.
That no one marries at the end of the play was a daring innovation for Victorian theatre, and the reviewer from ''Era'' mentioned his surprise at this. Synopsis notes:
In the short story, Peter is instead her nephew. This has no effect on the plot.
In the story, Boomblehardt's equivalent, Verditter, is instead courting the landlady, as her inn is profitable and she has some fine silver; therefore, he tries to bribe the fairy to leave in order that he may make money elsewhere.


Characters and original cast

As was common in Victorian drama, a woman (Maggie Brennan) played a young man (Peter).Stedman, p. 88. The play's script assigns dialogue to three numbered villagers in the opening scene. The named character of Jacques has no more lines than any of these and disappears after the first page of the script. Righton, who first played Boomblehardt, portrayed him as a Jewish caricature. Gilbert's script did not use a Jewish dialect, and historian Jane Stedman suggests that Righton's increasingly broad portrayal and interpolations show that Gilbert had little control of Righton's portrayal of the part.


Songs

The number of songs varied from production to production. The version submitted to the Lord Chamberlain had six songs, and an early review in ''The Times'' wrote that it was "overweighted with a quantity of extremely undramatic music", though the ''London Echo'' thought the music was "pretty". Nonetheless, the version printed in Gilbert's ''Original Plays'' (1911) cut these six songs to three, and some productions omitted the songs entirely. The list of songs in the licence copy is: # "Did you ever know a lady so particularly shady" – Jacques and villagers # "Some people love Spring" – Boomblehardt # "At home at last all danger past" – Sergeant Klooque # "A soldier in the King's Hussars" – Sergeant Klooque, Pipette, and Peter # "With furious blow" – Peter, Pipette, Sergeant Klooque, and Martha # "Finale: Go away, ma'am, go away, ma'am" – ensemble While the lyrics survive, none of the music was ever published, and it has been lost. The version in ''Original Plays'' omits the second verse of Nos. 1 and 6 and cuts Nos. 2, 3, and 5.


Critical reception

Reviews for the play were generally favourable, but it was criticised for its loose structure and lack of a substantial plot. ''Bell's Life in London and Sporting Chronicle'' opined: "Amusing, simple, and ingenious, 'Creatures of Impulse' is another, though a slight, addition to the successes of its author". The ''London Echo'' compared the piece to a "
burletta In theater and music history, a burletta (Italian, meaning "little joke", sometimes burla or burlettina) is a brief comic opera. In eighteenth-century Italy, a burletta was the comic intermezzo between the acts of an ''opera seria''. The extended w ...
of the stamp that was in vogue a hundred years ago, resembling ''Midas'', perhaps, more nearly than that of any modern burlesque", and wrote that it "contains pretty music, and smart if not witty dialogue, a semi-moral and a semi-plot".''The London Echo'', quoted in "Foreign Affairs", ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', 7 May 1871, p. 5.
''
The Graphic ''The Graphic'' was a British weekly illustrated newspaper, first published on 4 December 1869 by William Luson Thomas's company, Illustrated Newspapers Ltd with Thomas's brother, Lewis Samuel Thomas, as a co-founder. The Graphic was set up as ...
'' concluded that "Although it occupies only an hour in performance, the story is well told and the piece is exceedingly amusing" and praised the acting. Righton received special praise for his portrayal of Boomblehardt: "No character on stage perhaps ever made audiences laugh more in so short a time"."The Theatres" in ''
The Graphic ''The Graphic'' was a British weekly illustrated newspaper, first published on 4 December 1869 by William Luson Thomas's company, Illustrated Newspapers Ltd with Thomas's brother, Lewis Samuel Thomas, as a co-founder. The Graphic was set up as ...
'' (London, England), 22 April 1871, Issue 73
In an 1882 assessment of the piece for amateur theatre societies, M. E. James noted that "The singing is a great addition. It is altogether an amusing bit of nonsense, and very original".James, p. 30. ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...
'' review was less positive than most, saying that although the play was good, more was expected of Gilbert:


Notes


References

* Allen, Reginald (1963), ''W. S. Gilbert: An Anniversary Survey and Exhibition Checklist with Thirty-five Illustrations'', The Biographical Society of the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia. * Crowther, Andrew (2000). ''Contradiction Contradicted: The Plays of W. S. Gilbert'', Associated University Presses, London, . * * Gilbert, W.S. (1911). ''Original Plays, Fourth Series'', Chatto and Windus, London. * Gilbert, W. S. (1890). '' Foggerty's Fairy and Other Tales'', George Routledge and Sons, London. * James, M. E. (1882)
''What shall we act?''
G. Bell, Oxford University. * Meisel, Joseph S. (1999)
"The Importance of Being Serious: The Unexplored Connection between Gladstone and Humour
, ''History'', vol. 84, issue 274, April 1999. * Rees, Terence (1964). ''Thespis – A Gilbert & Sullivan Enigma''. London: Dillon's University Bookshop. *


Further reading

* Kertzer, Jon. "Life Plus Ninety-Nine Years: W.S. Gilbert and the Fantasy of Justice", ''Mosaic (Winnipeg)'', Vol. 36, 2003


External links



The Gilbert and Sullivan Archive
Photos from ''Creatures of Impulse''


in ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...
'' {{Gilbert and Sullivan 1871 plays Plays by W. S. Gilbert Works originally published in The Graphic