W. S. Gilbert

W. S. Gilbert's partnership with composer Arthur Sullivan produced fourteen comic operas, including HMS Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado, staged by the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte at his Savoy Theatre. They often quarrelled, notoriously over a carpet, yet each did his best work with the other, Gilbert's topsy-turvy plots matched by Sullivan's tunes. Together they effectively invented modern musical comedy in English.