It's arrived!

The first copies of the book arrived yesterday, and they're looking good! I was getting pretty neurotic about it, imagining that my corrections to the proofs might have been ignored or translated into nonsense. But the book seems to be all right (barring a couple of minor glitches). They arrived just in time, as I am going down to London to give a talk to the Gilbert and Sullivan Society, and will be able to sell copies. The big thing about the book is that it tells Gilbert's story as not just another Victorian success story, but as something more ambiguous and conflicted. It's a tale of struggle and opposition, and the success he achieved came at a price. There are some nice pics as well, particularly an unfamiliar one of Lucy Gilbert probably dating from the 1880s; she is magnificent in a formal gown, but there is an expression on her face which is impossible to describe. Most images of Lucy date either from her teenage years, when she had just married Gilbert, or from her years of age and serenity at the beginning of the twentieth century. I seem to have agreed to two interviews, one with the Stuart Box of the G&S Society and one with a guy who has a website. I'm just hoping I can be coherent and fluent on both occasions. We'll see.