The King and I The King and I The King and I is the fifth musical by the team of composer Richard Rodgers and dramatist Oscar Hammerstein II. It is based on Margaret Landon's novel, "Anna and the King of Siam" (1944), which is in turn derived from the memoirs of Anna Leonowens, governess to the children of King Mongkut of Siam in the early 1860s. The musical's plot relates the experiences of Anna, a British schoolteacher hired as part of the King's drive to modernize his country. The relationship between the King and Anna is marked by conflict through much of the piece,
Anna Leonowens reforms were goals established by his father. By 1869, Leonowens was in New York City, where she opened a school for girls for a brief period on Staten Island, and began contributing travel articles to a Boston journal, "Atlantic Monthly", including "The Favorite of the Harem", reviewed by "The New York Times" as "an Eastern love story, having apparently a strong basis of truth". She expanded her articles into two volumes of memoirs, beginning with "The English Governess at the Siamese Court" (1870), which earned her immediate fame but also brought charges of sensationalism. In her writing, she casts a