The Wicked World The Wicked World The Wicked World is a blank verse play by W. S. Gilbert in three acts. It opened at the Haymarket Theatre on 1873 and ran for a successful 145 performances, closing on 1873. The play is an allegory loosely based on a short illustrated story of the same title by Gilbert, written in 1871 and published in Tom Hood's "Comic Annual", about how pure fairies cope with a sudden introduction to them of "mortal love." Set in "Fairy Land", the action occurs within the space of 24 hours. Gilbert envisioned the set as resembling John Martin's 1853
Engaged (play) seen as drawing on "Engaged" are Noël Coward and Joe Orton. By 1877, Gilbert, now forty years old, was established as a dramatist. After his early burlesques of the 1860s he had turned to writing comic opera libretti and non-musical plays, both comic and serious. His musical successes included "Ages Ago" (music by Frederic Clay, 1869) and "Trial by Jury" (music by Arthur Sullivan (1875). His serious and comic non-musical plays included "Pygmalion and Galatea" (1871), "The Wicked World" (1873), "Sweethearts" (1874) and several others that played for well over 100 performances – good runs by the standards of the