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
Pygmalion and Galatea (play) and his wife Madge Robertson Kendal (sister of the playwright Tom Robertson), in the early 1870s. These plays, influenced by the fairy work of James Planché, are founded upon the idea of self-revelation by characters under the influence of some magic or some supernatural interference. The first was "The Palace of Truth" in 1870, a fantasy adapted from a story by Madame de Genlis. "Pygmalion and Galatea", a satire of sentimental, romantic attitudes toward myth, was one of seven plays that Gilbert produced in 1871. Together, these plays, and successors such as "The Wicked World" (1873), "Sweethearts" (1874), "Charity" (1874),