Gretchen (play)

Gretchen is a tragic four-act play, in blank verse, written by W. S. Gilbert in 1878–79 based on Goethe's version of part of the Faust legend.

[3] Gilbert was inspired to write Gretchen after seeing a picture called "Regrets", showing two priests, one of whom looks wistfully at a pair of lovers.

[4] He began to study Goethe's Faust in April 1878 and was ready to show his plot outline to Henry Neville, manager of the Olympic Theatre, in June 1878.

[6] He finished writing the play in December 1878 but did not agree with Neville on many production details, including which set and costume designers to use and some of the casting decisions.

[7][8] The cover of the theatre programme carried a lengthy note by Gilbert earnestly explaining that he was not attempting to put Faust on stage in its entirety, but simply to "re-model... the story of Gretchen's downfall".

[10] After the failure of Gretchen, Gilbert concentrated on the highly profitable Savoy Operas, writing only a few more plays during the rest of his life.

"[16] Reviewing the play's 1886 American production, The New York Times did not judge it to be among Gilbert's best, although the paper did find the treatment of the Faust story interesting, with many novel touches.

Soon, he realises that his life in monastic isolation is a hollow sham, and he desires to live in the real world, though he is still completely disillusioned with it.

As she dies, Gretchen forgives Faustus, advising him to devote the rest of his life to "faith, and truth, and works of charity".

Mousta in Broken Hearts (1875) is a hunchback rejected by a woman, and in The Yeomen of the Guard, Jack Point is destroyed by losing his love.

[18] Faustus has turned his back on the world which hurt him so deeply, but he is no happier in isolation in the monastery, as he cannot hew to the moral absolutes of the Church.