William Gilbert
#206,974 Most Popular
About
Famed dramatist and librettist whose comic operettas with composer Arthur Sullivan include The Mikado, H.M.S. Pinafore, and The Pirates of Penzance. As a playwright of non-musical works, he is known for Pygmalion and Galatea, The Wicked World, and Broken Hearts.
Before Fame
He attended Great Ealing School, where he wrote school plays and painted stage scenery. Several years later, he graduated from King's College, London and began writing comic magazine pieces under the pen name of "Bab."
Trivia
His popular operettas introduced many new phrases, including "let the punishment fit the crime," into to the English language.
Family Life
He and his three younger sisters were the children of William and Anne Gilbert. Following a relationship with writer Annie Thomas, W.S. Gilbert married Lucy Agnes Turner in 1867.
Associated With
Gilbert's famous collaboration with composer Sir Arthur Sullivan lasted from 1871 until the early 1890s.
