William Gilbert (author)
Encyclopedia
William Gilbert, was a British novelist and Royal Navy
surgeon
, and the author of novels, biographies, histories and several popular fantasy stories, mostly in the 1860s and 1870s. He is perhaps best remembered, however, as the father of dramatist W. S. Gilbert
of Gilbert and Sullivan
.
, Hampshire, the eldest son of William, a grocer in Commercial Row, Blackfriars, London, and Sarah. His father died at the age of 32 when young William was seven years old, and thereafter, he and his younger siblings, Joseph and Jane, were raised in London by their mother's sister and her husband, Mary and John Samuel Schwenck.
Gilbert served the East India Company as a midshipman
from 1818 to 1821 but was unhappy with the conditions and so quit the service. He then spent several years in Italy, returning to England about 1825. There he studied at Guy's Hospital
and then entered the Royal College of Surgeons
in 1830. He was an assistant surgeon in the navy for several years but left when he received an annuity from his father's estate. He first married Mary Ann Skelton in 1832, who died two years later, and then Anne Morris on 14 February 1836. The couple's famous son, W.S. Gilbert, was born on 18 November 1836. The Gilberts continued to travel in Europe, finally settling down in London in 1849. Even though Gilbert and his wife later had a troubled relationship, they produced, after W.S. Gilbert, three more children, Jane, Maude and Florence.
. In an age of male chauvinism, Gilbert also wrote several articles about discrimination against women.
In 1859, Gilbert published a novel, Margaret Meadows, A Tale for the Pharisees. This was made into a play called Mary Warner by Tom Taylor
in 1869. Gilbert's most successful early novel was Shirley Hall Asylum: Or the Memoirs of a Monomaniac (1863), which told the stories of inmates of a lunatic asylum from the point of view of an escapee driven mad by trying to solve the problem of perpetual motion
. Gilbert's first novel published under his own name was Christmas Tale: The Rosary, a Legend of Wilton Abbey (1863). The story purports to be the written confession of one Alicia Longspée, who had been Lady Abbess of the Benedictine Convent at Wilton
in the 15th century. Gilbert's next novel, De Profundis, a tale of the social deposits (1864) is the story of a foundling rescued by a Scottish Fusilier Guardsman stationed in London. The foundling grows up to marry the guardsman's daughter. Another 1864 book was The Goldsworthy Family, or the country attorney, about an unethical lawyer.
Gilbert's 1865 book, The Magic Mirror (about a mirror that grants wishes), containing stories with a moral was illustrated by his multi-talented son. Gilbert also wrote histories and articles and stories for numerous periodicals (often anonymously), including Cornhill, Temple Bar, St. Paul's, the Quiver, The Contemporary Review, The Sunday Magazine, Good Things, Good Words, Strahan's Boy's and Girl's (sic) Annual and The Fortnightly Review.
Among Gilbert's best-known, and most popular, works were his Innominato tales of the supernatural, published in various magazines, including Argosy, and finally collected in The Wizard of the Mountain (1867). One of the best-known is "The Last Lords of Gardonal" (1867). These stories concerned the adventures of an enigmatic wizard and astrologer called the Innominato (in English, "Nameless"), in 14th century Italy, who tried to use his powers to help people.
squire's son who becomes a midshipman and is marooned of the coast of Africa. Another 1869 novel was Sir Thomas Branston. Later that year, Gilbert produced his most famous biography, Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara: a biography: Illustrated by rare and unpublished documents. In this work, Gilbert concluded, after extensive research, that there was no evidence of the acts of gross immorality of which Borgia was accused, including murder. This was followed in 1870 by The Inquisitor, or the Struggle in Ferrara, about the life of Renée of France
, Duchess of Ferrara, set in 1554.
In 1871, the novel Martha was followed by The Landlord of the "Sun", again describing a descent into degradation, this time involving a villainous seducer, an illegitimate child and drunkenness, and, in 1873, by Clara Levesque. Another theme that was seen in Gilbert's writings was his dislike of established religion and the Roman Catholic Church in particular. Two works on this theme included Facta non Verba: a comparison between the good works performed by the ladies in Roman Catholic communities in England and the unfettered efforts of their Protestant sisters (1874) and Disestablishment from a Church point of view (1875).
Gilbert had a mercurial temper and was difficult to live with, imposing arbitrary restrictions on his wife and daughters. After many years of strained relations with his wife, Gilbert left home and separated from her in 1876 after forty years of marriage. He left his wife and daughters substantial incomes and the family home, assuming that he would be able to earn a good living from his writing. However, he soon became seriously ill and appeared to be dying, and his doctors advised him not to write. His wife did not assist in his care and did not, ultimately, allow him to return home. Her son appealed to her on his father's behalf, but she would not change her mind. W. S. Gilbert apparently never contacted his mother again. Instead, Gilbert went to live with Jane, his only married daughter, and her husband in The Close at Salisbury
, where he resided for the rest of his life.
In 1877, Gilbert published Them Boots, another description of characters from the lowest class of society, as well as The City. Pursuing another favourite theme, the dangers of drink, Gilbert also published in 1877 Nothing but the Truth, an unvarnished picture of the effects of intemperance. 1879 saw the publication of Mrs. Dubosq's Bible, about a French Huguenot
group in Spitalfields
in the 18th century, and the possession of a 1650 Geneva Bible by a poor person. In 1880, Memoirs of a Cynic was a protest against cruelty and hypocrisy. This was followed in 1881 by Modern Wonders of the World, or the new Sinbad, a series of 10 stories told to London children by Hassan, the son of an Egyptian slave dealer. His last book, published in 1882, Legion, or the modern demoniac, returns to Gilbert's campaign against drink, which, he illustrated, leads to "crime, profligacy, suicide, homicide, brutality, cruelty, pauperism, idiocy and insanity."
Gilbert died at the age of 86 and was buried in The Close at Salisbury. Direct descendants of the Gilbert family still live in Cornwall
, England.
Short stories:
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
surgeon
Surgeon
In medicine, a surgeon is a specialist in surgery. Surgery is a broad category of invasive medical treatment that involves the cutting of a body, whether human or animal, for a specific reason such as the removal of diseased tissue or to repair a tear or breakage...
, and the author of novels, biographies, histories and several popular fantasy stories, mostly in the 1860s and 1870s. He is perhaps best remembered, however, as the father of dramatist W. S. Gilbert
W. S. Gilbert
Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
of Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...
.
Life and career
Gilbert was born at BishopstokeBishopstoke
Bishopstoke, a village recorded in the Domesday Book, is a civil parish in the borough of Eastleigh in Hampshire, England. Bishopstoke was also mentioned when King Alfred the Great's grandson King Eadred, granted land at "Stohes" to Thegn Aelfric in 948 AD. The village is about a mile east of...
, Hampshire, the eldest son of William, a grocer in Commercial Row, Blackfriars, London, and Sarah. His father died at the age of 32 when young William was seven years old, and thereafter, he and his younger siblings, Joseph and Jane, were raised in London by their mother's sister and her husband, Mary and John Samuel Schwenck.
Gilbert served the East India Company as a midshipman
Midshipman
A midshipman is an officer cadet, or a commissioned officer of the lowest rank, in the Royal Navy, United States Navy, and many Commonwealth navies. Commonwealth countries which use the rank include Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Kenya...
from 1818 to 1821 but was unhappy with the conditions and so quit the service. He then spent several years in Italy, returning to England about 1825. There he studied at Guy's Hospital
Guy's Hospital
Guy's Hospital is a large NHS hospital in the borough of Southwark in south east London, England. It is administratively a part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust. It is a large teaching hospital and is home to the King's College London School of Medicine...
and then entered the Royal College of Surgeons
Royal College of Surgeons of England
The Royal College of Surgeons of England is an independent professional body and registered charity committed to promoting and advancing the highest standards of surgical care for patients, regulating surgery, including dentistry, in England and Wales...
in 1830. He was an assistant surgeon in the navy for several years but left when he received an annuity from his father's estate. He first married Mary Ann Skelton in 1832, who died two years later, and then Anne Morris on 14 February 1836. The couple's famous son, W.S. Gilbert, was born on 18 November 1836. The Gilberts continued to travel in Europe, finally settling down in London in 1849. Even though Gilbert and his wife later had a troubled relationship, they produced, after W.S. Gilbert, three more children, Jane, Maude and Florence.
Early writing career
Gilbert began his writing career around 1857. He was concerned, throughout his life, with the welfare of the poor and served as honorary secretary of the Society of the Relief of Distress. His interest in the poor is evident in his writing, and one of his recurring themes was that poverty, not genealogy, was the major cause of crime and the main factor in one's later fortunes. This theme would also be seen in his son's writing. One of the elder Gilbert's first pieces was a pamphlet entitled, "On the Present System of Rating for the Relief of the Poor in the Metropolis" (1857). In 1858, anonymously, Gilbert published Dives and Lazarus, or the adventures of an obscure medical man in a low neighbourhood. The book was a fictional account focusing on what Gilbert saw as the increasing disparity in the lives of the rich and the poor. A similar theme pervades another early Gilbert novel, The Weaver's Family (1860). This theme continued to concern Gilbert throughout his career including in Contrasts; dedicated to the ratepayers of London (1873) and in one of his fiercest attacks on social abuses, The City; An Inquiry into the Corporation, its livery companies, and the administration of their charities and endowments (1877), describing how 50,000 working-class people were evicted from their dwellings to make room for the Metropolitan RailwayMetropolitan railway
Metropolitan Railway can refer to:* Metropolitan line, part of the London Underground* Metropolitan Railway, the first underground railway to be built in London...
. In an age of male chauvinism, Gilbert also wrote several articles about discrimination against women.
In 1859, Gilbert published a novel, Margaret Meadows, A Tale for the Pharisees. This was made into a play called Mary Warner by Tom Taylor
Tom Taylor
Tom Taylor was an English dramatist, critic, biographer, public servant, and editor of Punch magazine...
in 1869. Gilbert's most successful early novel was Shirley Hall Asylum: Or the Memoirs of a Monomaniac (1863), which told the stories of inmates of a lunatic asylum from the point of view of an escapee driven mad by trying to solve the problem of perpetual motion
Perpetual motion
Perpetual motion describes hypothetical machines that operate or produce useful work indefinitely and, more generally, hypothetical machines that produce more work or energy than they consume, whether they might operate indefinitely or not....
. Gilbert's first novel published under his own name was Christmas Tale: The Rosary, a Legend of Wilton Abbey (1863). The story purports to be the written confession of one Alicia Longspée, who had been Lady Abbess of the Benedictine Convent at Wilton
Wilton Abbey
Wilton Abbey was a Benedictine convent in Wiltshire, England, three miles from Salisbury on the site now occupied by Wilton House. A first foundation was made as a college of secular priests by Wulfstan, Ealdorman of Wiltshire, about 773, but after his death was changed into a convent for twelve...
in the 15th century. Gilbert's next novel, De Profundis, a tale of the social deposits (1864) is the story of a foundling rescued by a Scottish Fusilier Guardsman stationed in London. The foundling grows up to marry the guardsman's daughter. Another 1864 book was The Goldsworthy Family, or the country attorney, about an unethical lawyer.
Gilbert's 1865 book, The Magic Mirror (about a mirror that grants wishes), containing stories with a moral was illustrated by his multi-talented son. Gilbert also wrote histories and articles and stories for numerous periodicals (often anonymously), including Cornhill, Temple Bar, St. Paul's, the Quiver, The Contemporary Review, The Sunday Magazine, Good Things, Good Words, Strahan's Boy's and Girl's (sic) Annual and The Fortnightly Review.
Among Gilbert's best-known, and most popular, works were his Innominato tales of the supernatural, published in various magazines, including Argosy, and finally collected in The Wizard of the Mountain (1867). One of the best-known is "The Last Lords of Gardonal" (1867). These stories concerned the adventures of an enigmatic wizard and astrologer called the Innominato (in English, "Nameless"), in 14th century Italy, who tried to use his powers to help people.
Later years
In 1868, Gilbert wrote The Doctor of Beauweir, an autobiography, told from the point of view of a South Wales medic. King George's Middy (1869), also illustrated by W. S. Gilbert, relates the adventures of a LeicestershireLeicestershire
Leicestershire is a landlocked county in the English Midlands. It takes its name from the heavily populated City of Leicester, traditionally its administrative centre, although the City of Leicester unitary authority is today administered separately from the rest of Leicestershire...
squire's son who becomes a midshipman and is marooned of the coast of Africa. Another 1869 novel was Sir Thomas Branston. Later that year, Gilbert produced his most famous biography, Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara: a biography: Illustrated by rare and unpublished documents. In this work, Gilbert concluded, after extensive research, that there was no evidence of the acts of gross immorality of which Borgia was accused, including murder. This was followed in 1870 by The Inquisitor, or the Struggle in Ferrara, about the life of Renée of France
Renée of France
Renée de France was the younger daughter of Louis XII of France and Anne, Duchess of Brittany. Her elder sister was Queen Claude of France. She was the Duchess of Ferrara due to her marriage to Ercole II d'Este, grandson of Pope Alexander VI...
, Duchess of Ferrara, set in 1554.
In 1871, the novel Martha was followed by The Landlord of the "Sun", again describing a descent into degradation, this time involving a villainous seducer, an illegitimate child and drunkenness, and, in 1873, by Clara Levesque. Another theme that was seen in Gilbert's writings was his dislike of established religion and the Roman Catholic Church in particular. Two works on this theme included Facta non Verba: a comparison between the good works performed by the ladies in Roman Catholic communities in England and the unfettered efforts of their Protestant sisters (1874) and Disestablishment from a Church point of view (1875).
Gilbert had a mercurial temper and was difficult to live with, imposing arbitrary restrictions on his wife and daughters. After many years of strained relations with his wife, Gilbert left home and separated from her in 1876 after forty years of marriage. He left his wife and daughters substantial incomes and the family home, assuming that he would be able to earn a good living from his writing. However, he soon became seriously ill and appeared to be dying, and his doctors advised him not to write. His wife did not assist in his care and did not, ultimately, allow him to return home. Her son appealed to her on his father's behalf, but she would not change her mind. W. S. Gilbert apparently never contacted his mother again. Instead, Gilbert went to live with Jane, his only married daughter, and her husband in The Close at Salisbury
Salisbury
Salisbury is a cathedral city in Wiltshire, England and the only city in the county. It is the second largest settlement in the county...
, where he resided for the rest of his life.
In 1877, Gilbert published Them Boots, another description of characters from the lowest class of society, as well as The City. Pursuing another favourite theme, the dangers of drink, Gilbert also published in 1877 Nothing but the Truth, an unvarnished picture of the effects of intemperance. 1879 saw the publication of Mrs. Dubosq's Bible, about a French Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
group in Spitalfields
Spitalfields
Spitalfields is a former parish in the borough of Tower Hamlets, in the East End of London, near to Liverpool Street station and Brick Lane. The area straddles Commercial Street and is home to many markets, including the historic Old Spitalfields Market, founded in the 17th century, Sunday...
in the 18th century, and the possession of a 1650 Geneva Bible by a poor person. In 1880, Memoirs of a Cynic was a protest against cruelty and hypocrisy. This was followed in 1881 by Modern Wonders of the World, or the new Sinbad, a series of 10 stories told to London children by Hassan, the son of an Egyptian slave dealer. His last book, published in 1882, Legion, or the modern demoniac, returns to Gilbert's campaign against drink, which, he illustrated, leads to "crime, profligacy, suicide, homicide, brutality, cruelty, pauperism, idiocy and insanity."
Gilbert died at the age of 86 and was buried in The Close at Salisbury. Direct descendants of the Gilbert family still live in Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
, England.
Works
Novels and collections:- Dives and Lazarus, or the adventures of an obscure medical man in a low neighbourhood (1858)
- Margaret Meadows, A Tale for the Pharisees (1858)
- The Weaver's Family (1860)
- Shirley Hall Asylum: Or the Memoirs of a Monomaniac (1863)
- Christmas Tale: The Rosary, a Legend of Wilton Abbey (1863)
- De Profundis, a tale of the social deposits (1864)
- The Goldsworthy Family, or the country attorney (1864)
- Doctor Austin's Guests (1866)
- The Magic Mirror: A Round of Tales for Young and Old (1865; illustrated by W. S. GilbertW. S. GilbertSir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
) - Doctor Austen's Guests (1866; a sequel to Shirley Hall Asylum)
- The Wizard of the Mountain (volume 1); (volume 2) (1867)
- The Doctor of Beauweir, an autobiography (1868)
- The Seven League Boots (1869; illustrated by W. S. Gilbert)
- King George’s Middy (1869; illustrated by W. S. Gilbert)
- Sir Thomas Branston (1869)
- Martha (1871)
- The Landlord of the "Sun" (1871)
- Clara Levesque (1873)
- Them Boots (1877)
- James Duke, Costermonger. A tale of the social aspects (c. 1879)
- Mrs. Dubosq's Bible (1879)
- Memoirs of a Cynic (1880)
- Modern Wonders of the World, or the new Sinbad (1881)
Short stories:
- "A Visit to a Convict Lunatic Asylum" (1864)
- "The Sacristan of St. Botolph" (1866)
- "Ruth Thornbury, or The Old Maid's Story" (1866)
- "The Doctor Onofrio" (1867) *
- "Fra Gerolamo" (1867) *
- "The Magic Flower" (1867) *
- "The Last Lords of Gardonal" (1867) *
- "Tomas and Pepina" (1867) *
- "The Robber Chief" (1867) *
- "Don Bucefalo and the Curate" (1867) **
- "The Physician's Daughter" (1867) **
- "The Two Lovers" (1867) **
- "The Stranger" (1867) **
- "The Innominato's Confession" (1867) **
- "Friar Peter’s Confession" (1869)
- "How Brother Ignatius Became a Monk" (1869)
- "How Brother Jonas, the Sub-Cellarer, Was Haunted by an Evil Spirit" (1869)
- "The Seven League Boots" (1869; illustrated by W. S. Gilbert)
- "The Shrine of Santa Clara" (1869)
- "Walter, the Sub-Steward" (1869)
- "The Invisible Prince" (1872)
- "The abuse of charity in London: the case of the five Royal Hospitals" (1878)
- "The London medical schools" (1879)
- Note: * denotes a story collected in The Wizard of the Mountain (volume 1)
-
- denotes a story collected in The Wizard of the Mountain (volume2)
-