The Rest Is History - 12 Days: Good King Wenceslas and the first Gilbert & Sullivan

Episode Date: December 26, 2021

Was Wenceslas good? Was he a king? And Dominic remembers the popular Victorian light opera maestros first production "Thespis". *The Rest Is History Live Tour 2023*: Tom and Dominic are back on tour this autumn! See them live in London, New Zealand, and Australia! Buy your tickets here: restishistorypod.com Twitter:  @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Thank you for listening to The Rest Is History. For weekly bonus episodes, ad-free listening, early access to series, and membership of our much-loved chat community, go to therestishistory.com and join the club. That is therestishistory.com. Welcome to The Rest Is History. We are at number two in the 12 days of Christmas, but The Rest Is History being The Rest Is History, we're not really doing the 12 days. We're doing the 13 days, aren't we, Tom? We are.

Do you want to explain why we're doing 13 days for those people who missed day one? Well, because the 12 days of Christmas, you can begin them either on Christmas Day or on today, Boxing Day, 26th of December. And because we're Gluttons for Punishment, we're hedging our bets and we're doing both. So this will be running to the 6th of January. And for those of you who missed the first one, we chose two very light, frivolous subjects.

We did the correlation of Charlemagne and the birth of the holy roman empire and then we did the resignation of mikhail gorbachev from the end of the ussr so two very jolly festive seasonal topics but today's well they're definitely one of them is definitely very very seasonal and festive yes and they're both musical and they're both jolly aren't they both jolly yes so i've chosen um're both jolly, yes. So I've chosen Good King Wenceslas Looking Out on the Feast of Stephen When the snow lay round about deep and crisp and even. Brightly shone

the moon that night, though the frost was cruel When a poor man came in sight, gathering winter fuel. Do you not want to sing that? You're not going to sing that? I'm going to sing it a bit later on. I've got another verse to sing. That's something for people to look forward to. You can probably tell from my... I've got a slightly sore throat. Yeah.

So when are we, Tom? Well, so when are we? So this carol, very famous one, is written in 1853, the lyrics. Okay. By a man called John Mason Neill. Yeah. Who is Anglo-Catholic. So he's Church of England, which is Protestant,

but he's very keen on the kind of Catholic inheritance of the Church of England. He's keen on saints and all that kind of stuff. And so he's interested in the example of Good King Wenceslas, who is a Bohemian saint from the 10th century. And so the music that he uses is actually it's not christmasy it's um associated with easter so it's it's a 13th century hymn um tempus ad est floridum say tempus ad est floridum which means of course uh it's easter so so isn't that amazing so that's the kind of interesting

detail um but of course begs the question so who who is good king w? So that's the kind of interesting detail. But of course, begs the question. So who, who is good King Wenceslas? That's what I want to know. That's what the listeners want to know. Do you know? He was good,

but he wasn't, he wasn't a king. Was he, was he a Duke? He was a Duke. He was the Duke of Bohemia. And he's, so he's,

he's around the same time as Athelstan. So he's ruling Bohemia at the same time as Athelstan is, is becoming really Bohemian at the same time as Athelstan is, is becoming King of England. So, um, nine twenties, nine thirties. I'm just looking at his dates now.

Nine 21 to nine 35. Yep. Pretty, pretty much exactly the same time as that. And he really was. Yes. I'm reading it. I'm reading it as we speak.

He really was called, he really was called Wenceslas. Yeah. I just assumed that was a sort of Anglicization of some impenetrable Slavic name. But he's, because he's so saintly and holy, and as we'll discover, because he gets murdered and therefore people say he was martyred, he's posthumously created a king by Otto the Great,

who we mentioned yesterday. Very much a friend of the show. Very much a friend of the show. Very much a friend of the 12 Days of Christmas. We should try and work Otto the Great, who we mentioned yesterday. Very much a friend of the show. Very much a friend of the show. Very much a friend of the 12 Days of Christmas. We should try and work Otto the Great into every single episode. So he is, I mean, basically he's just, he's, I think he's the grandson of the Bohemian who converted to Christianity. He's just rushes around,

you know, he's a bit like Scrooge after his visit from the three ghosts, right? Just rushes around kind of handing out stuff to poor people. And the, the, so the original story, but his deeds,

I think, you know, better than I could tell you for, as is read in his passion, no one doubts that rising every night from his noble bed with bare feet and only one chamberlain. He went around to God's churches and gave arms generously to widows, orphans, those in prison and afflicted by every difficulty. So much so that he was considered not a prince, but the father of all the wretched. So that story of him seeing a poor man gathering winter fuel and he summons his page and they go out.

And remember that the, the page struggles. So the page thing, sire, the night is darker now and the wind blows stronger fails. My heart. I know not how I can go no longer. Mark my footsteps.

Good. My page tread thou in them boldly. Thou shalt find the winter's rage. Freeze thy blood. Let's go. Hold Lee. So that's the miracle. That's beautiful. Thank you. Thank you. So that's the miracle. That's beautiful. Thank you.

So that's the miracle, is that good King Wenceslas, he has a thermal quality to his bare feet. He's a radiator. He's a living, saintly radiator. But, but, but, he has a brother who

brilliantly is called Bollislaus the Cruel. So you can imagine them growing up in their bohemian nursery. Yeah. And there's a massive clue, you know, a huge clue that it's not going to end that well when your brother's called the Cruel. Bollislaus, I'm looking at this, Bollislaus is four years younger. Yeah.

So he probably is driven mad by Wenceslas' niceness and kindness. Yes, I mean, he can't go out in the snow and warm it up with his radiated light feet. So he gets cross, and there's a coup, and Wenceslas gets run through by a spear. Some say held by Bolleslas himself. Oh, golly. And so Bolleslaus is actually quite a good king. Yeah, I'm reading it. This is a fascinating story, Tom.

It's so fascinating that while you're talking, I'm actually reading a web page on it. Okay, well, contribute. No, I will contribute. I'll tell you a fact. So according to tradition, at the very moment that Wenceslas was murdered, Bonoslaus had a son.

His son was born. Did you see that? Yeah. Do you know what his son was called? I can't remember. Straskvas. Do you know what that means? No.

A dreadful feast. A dreadful feast? Yeah. Well, that's fair enough then, isn't it? And did he have a soubriquet? Well, I mean, does he need a soubriquet? I mean, if you're called a dreadful beast so he doesn't succeed bollislaus bollislaus is succeeded by his eldest

son who's also his good no bollislaus the pious oh so you've got good thing is this yeah bollislaus the cruel bollislaus the pious it's a real roller coaster for the Czechs, isn't it? So Bohemian history in the 10th century is great. And the story is Wenceslas, for the Bohemians, for the Czechs, is a bit of a King Arthur figure. Yeah. So it is thought that he's asleep underneath a mountain and that when the Czechs need him, he will wake up.

Or that there's a large statue of him in Prague in Wenceslas Square. underneath a mountain and that when the Czechs need him, he will wake up. Or that there's a large statue of him in Prague, in Wenceslaus Square, frankly enough, and that statue will come alive and he will lead a procession over the bridge, Charles Bridge, and he will stumble

and as he stumbles, his sword will be revealed. Bruncvich. Bruncvich. and as he stumbles, his sword will be revealed. Ooh. Bruntvik. Bruntvik. Bruntvik. That's a good name for a sword.

I will say this. If Wenceslas were planning to return, I think he would have done so already. Yes. The Czechs had a pretty tough time in the 20th century. Yeah. There were multiple opportunities for him to make his appearance. Yeah.

And he failed to do so. Yeah. Poor. And this is worse to come his appearance. And he failed to do so. Poor. And less is worse to come. Also, if you, you know, surely you'd want Bolleslaus the Cruel to come back, wouldn't you? I mean, he's the person you'd need in your irony. You wouldn't want... Well, it depends if you're...

When does this go around giving presents to people? It depends if you're walking barefoot in the winter or not. I suppose so, yeah. Because if you're doing that, you definitely want... Red barefoot in the winter or not i suppose so yeah because if you're like because if you're doing that you definitely want um red army tanks in the park spring with a super power well maybe that's why he didn't come maybe the great crisis facing the bohemians the czechs will be that they need someone to warm up the pavements with his feet yeah and that's what he'll do have you seen seen this thing that the Czechs have renamed their country in the last few years?

Czechia. Yeah, you see it on Google Maps. Yeah. Rather than the Czech Republic. Do you think Czechia will catch on? I wish it was called Bohemia. But it can't be because of Moravia. Moravians don't want it to be called Bohemia.

And to call it, because it's actually made up of three regions, Bohemia, Moravia, and part of Silesia. I'm really sad that Bohemia has, has kind of vanished from the map. Yeah, it's a good name.

It's a bit like Persia. Yeah. There's a kind of romance to it. I agree. There's a great romance to it. It's very 30 years war. I always think kind of. Well,

very, very 10th century, I think. Yeah. Well, anyway, so that's Bohemia. That's Gunk Wenceslas.

Should we take a break now, Tom? Have you got anything more to say about Good King? Do you want to do more singing? Do you want to sing a song? No, no, because when we come back, we're doing Gilbert and Sullivan, aren't we? Yeah, and I can assure you, I'm absolutely not going to be singing.

Are you not? No. Because the music is lost. So I've got a good reason. But you could sing some Gilbert and Sullivan. Very model of a modern major general. I am a very model of a modern major general. Goodbye.

I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman. And together we host The Rest Is Entertainment. It's your weekly fix of entertainment news, reviews, splash of showbiz gossip. And on our Q&A, we pull back the curtain on entertainment and we tell you how it all works. We have just launched our Members Club. If you want ad-free listening, bonus episodes and early access to live tickets, head to therestisentertainment.com.

That's therestisentertainment.com. Hello, welcome back to The Restless History on Boxing Day, St Stephen's Day, 26th of December. We've already ticked off Good King Wenceslas looking out. And now, Dominic, you have another musical number for us, Gilbert and Sullivan themed. I do, I do. So Boxing Day is a day of jollity and a day of music.

Boxing? And a day of, yeah, just a day of general sort of hijinks and stuff. So I thought Gilbert & Sullivan would be a great place to come in. So Gilbert & Sullivan, the great kind of Victorian sort of light opera stars of British popular culture, incredibly popular around the world, particularly in America. So if you look at the list of kind of amateur performances and things that Gilbert and Sullivan plays,

I mean, the number in America is mind-boggling. But their very first play, Tom, it's a Greek theme, you see. That's why I thought, that's why I picked it. So their very first collaboration in 1871, starting on Boxing Day 1871. That's the day it opened, is it? Yes, the day it opened. The Gaiety Theatre was an opera called Thespis,

or The God's Grown Old. So you've got these two characters. You've got Gilbert, who's a bit older, who's the son of a naval surgeon. He does the words. And Sullivan, who's a great composer, son of a military bandmaster who was born in 1842, and he does the music. Now, Sullivan sees himself as a sort of great composer, son of a military bandmaster who was born in 1842. And he does the music.

Now, Sullivan sees himself as a sort of serious composer, which he was. And unfortunately, he's always, you know, he's sort of... He's paired up with a comedian. Yeah, it's the classic thing. It's sort of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle trying to escape Sherlock Holmes. Sullivan is always slightly trying to escape Gilbert and Sullivan. But Gilbert kind of drags him back in with his stories of magic lozenges and things of this pirate.

And skull bells. Yeah, all of this sort of stuff. So they get brought together to work on this opera. It's basically a Christmas entertainment. The plan is for it to just run for a few weeks or months. It is advertised as an entirely original grotesque opera in two acts. I like that. Grotesque opera.

Grotesque opera. Say, well, if you were going to enter an opera, you want it to be pretty grotesque, I think. Yeah. So the story. Do you want to know the story, Tom? Well, so Thespis is the first actor. Yeah, the father of drama.

Is he the first actor or? He's the person who first acts in a tragedy. Yeah, exactly. So the plan is, so the story is that basically the gods have grown elderly on Mount Olympus, and they're just bored, and they feel like no one listens to them anymore. And is this set in ancient Greece or in?

Yeah, in ancient Greece, not modern Greece. Okay. So they fancy a change, and they decide that they will swap places with Thespis and his actors. So the actors will come up to Olympus, and the story is basically them trying to rule the universe, and they are terrible at it. And does hilarity ensue?

It does. So the replacement for Mars, do you know what his name is? Timidon. Oh, that's... And Timidon, do you know what his name is? Timidon. Oh, that's... And Timidon, do you know what's so comic about this? He's a pacifist. He's a pacifist. It's hilarious.

Yeah. The substitute for Hymen, the kind of goddess of marriage. Yeah. She doesn't want to marry anybody. That's the joke. She's a confirmed spinster. And the guy who's replacing Pluto. He's a confirmed spinster. And the guy who's replacing Pluto. Is a spendthrift.

No, he doesn't like anybody dying. Doesn't let anybody die. Doesn't want anyone to come to the underworld. God, hilarity does ensue. Yeah, it's mayhem. It's absolute mayhem. It's hilarious. The gods down on Earth.

It's just what you want, a boxing day. The gods down on Earth, they're you want to have a boxing day the gods down on earth they're uh they're shocked by this carry on and they um they return to olympus and they kick out the actors and they say go back to earth your fate is to become eminent tragedians who no one ever goes to see that's funny that's still funny and that's uh that's what happens so it runs so this opens on boxing day and it runs for 63 performances. Which is a success. Which is a great success. And a lot of people think it's very funny.

Well, the public think it's funny, but the critics are not terribly impressed. So do you want to hear a couple of the reviews? Yeah. A publication called The Hornet. You wouldn't want to be reviewed by The Hornet. You wouldn't. So the problem is they review only the premiere, and the premiere is much, much too long.

So in the sort of the adverts, the management of the Gaiety Theatre have said you must book your carriages for 11 o'clock, but it's gone past 12, and the play is still going on at midnight. The jayfury is still ongoing. So The Hornet, the play is still going on at midnight. The jayfury is still ongoing. So the Hornets, the play is actually called Thespis or the God's Grown Old, but the headline on the Hornets review is Thespis,

the God's Grown Old and Wearisome in capital letters. The morning advertiser says, it is a dreary, tedious, two-act rigmarole of a plot, grotesque without wit and the music thin without liveliness. The curtain falls before a yawning and weary audience. But apart from that, how did you enjoy the play? So the music, I think, is lost. That's why I can't sing it, much as I would like to.

That is a shame. Because obviously at that point, no one knows that Gilbert and Sullivan is going to turn out into this tremendous franchise. But how come they haven't kept the music? How come they haven't kept the music? Yeah. I don't know. I think Sullivan just probably dashed it off.

Knocked it off. Yeah, just thought this is a load of old tosh. Make some money out of it. Quite odd not to have kept it, though. Well, I don't know. I mean, I haven't claimed to be a Sullivanologist. Okay. So anyway, their next thing is a thing called Trial by Jury.

That's, I think, reasonably successful. And then they get into the world of Topsy-Turvy-dom. Have you seen the film Topsy-Turvy? No. It's great actually. Is that the... Mike Lee. Mike Lee film.

No, I haven't. It's really good. I've never seen the Gilbert and Sullivan. I don't know anything about them. I mean, I do, because I vaguely... Paris at Penzance. Modern Made in General. The Mikado.

A short, sharp shock. Yeah. It's the kind of thing, I do, because I vaguely... Paris or Penzance? I'm a modern major general. The Mikado? A short, sharp shock? Yeah. It's the kind of thing, I suppose, I think Gilbert and Sullivan for people of our generation are slightly tainted, because it's the kind of thing that's very unlovely. Pomp-de-dee, pomp-de-dee, pomp-de-dee. All that kind of stuff. Very unlovely.

Sort of John Major-era cabinet ministers would recite it at Tory party conferences. Yes, they would. As part of an attack on single mothers. Yes, it was Peter Lilly, wasn't it? It was. He sung a bit of Gilbert and Sullivan and the audience loved it, but the rest of the country was absolutely appalled.

And voted for Tony Blair. But I think Gilbert and Sullivan is very jolly. It's all sort of gentle satire of institutions and so on. So should I watch one? Would you recommend I should? I think the Mikado, I think you should watch Topsy Turvy, the film, because that is brilliant.

Okay. Jim Broadbent is... Do I need to know about it? No, you can know nothing about it at all. Okay, I'll do that. It's a brilliant recreation of Victorian England and of that world. And then the most famous ones

are probably the Pirates of Penzance and the Mikado. And the Mikado, yeah. The Mikado is now in danger, isn't it, of being, it's been seen as the ultimate cultural appropriation because it's all about Japan. It is beautiful. Three Little Maids, Three Little Maids Are We? Three Little Maids, do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do.

I don't know the words, but that's how it goes. Anyway, I've seen the Mikado and it's very... They're Chinese, aren't they? No, Japanese, of course. Japanese, Japanese. So Gilbert had been to an exhibition of Japanese sort of arts and stuff and that gave him the idea for the Mikado but it's actually not about

Japan I mean the joke is it's a kind of parody of the great poobah is like the sort of the civil servant I mean it's clearly it's a bit like the importance of being earnest or that you don't have to have seen it it's kind of floats around as you know

vaguely synthesised idea and there are these idioms like a short sharp shock that have of floats around as, you know, vaguely synthesized ideas. And there are these idioms, like a short sharp shock, that have sort of penetrated into the language because of Gilman Sullivan. They're actually just as popular in America. So you'll see loads of references to it in kind of, you know, that sort of kind of American, tweety American columnist who will quote Gilman Sullivan. Yes.

So the Mikado is genuinely problematic, is it? I don't think it is genuinely problematic because people fought back against its cancellation because they pointed out it's not meant to be about Japan. It's about Britain, isn't it? It's about Britain. It's the satire of Britain. Yeah, exactly.

It's that kind of thing. It's the satire of Britain and it uses the, and the joke is that it's a bad version of Japan and it's not a real well that's very that's very up to date satire

so so that's so I think everybody should watch so obviously Turb is a brilliant Boxing Day film it's very jolly well do you know Dominic

great music you've inspired me I will I will watch it on Boxing Day I'll watch it today because of course today is Boxing Day brilliant

brilliant you haven't given the game away that we're recording before i know i almost blew it there but i think i think we got away with it yeah so anyway uh have a very happy rest of boxing day um and we will see you tomorrow with our choices for two events that fell on the 27th of December. Bye-bye. Thanks for listening to The Rest Is History. For bonus episodes, early access, ad-free listening, and access to our chat community, please sign up at restishistorypod.com. That's restishistorypod.com.