The Princess (play)

The Princess (play)

The Princess is a blank verse farcical play, in five scenes with music, by W. S. Gilbert which adapts and parodies Alfred Lord Tennyson's humorous 1847 narrative poem, The Princess: A Medley. It was first produced at the Olympic Theatre in London on 8 January 1870.

Gilbert called the piece "a whimsical allegory ... a respectful operatic per-version" of Tennyson's poem. The play was a modest success, playing for about 82 performances through April and enjoying a provincial tour. Gilbert liked the theme so much that he adapted the play as the libretto to Princess Ida (1884), one of his Savoy Operas with Arthur Sullivan. The Princess is a satire of women's education, a controversial subject in 1847, when Queen's College first opened in London, and in 1870 (Girton opened in 1869), but less so by 1884.