Benford's G&S Lexicon Entries for The Gondoliers
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Act I
Elevation to exalted position. See also The Grand Duke.
From the French timonier: a helmsman or steersman, and by poetic license, a gondolier.
In Gilbert’s day this simply meant drinking alcoholic beverages to excess (115, 229). Today it more often means taking small, but frequent, intoxicating drinks (75, 250). “He sometimes drinks a little –– if that’s all that’s left in the bottle.“
A teenager. A boy on the verge of becoming a man. (The clear implication of the narrative is that the prince was still a baby at the time, but let’s consider the exigence of rhyme and be forgiving.)
An arthritic affliction associated with acute swelling and painful inflammation of the smaller joints, especially of the big toe. Baptisto Palmieri’s taste for drink may be in part to blame for his affliction (106). Gilbert himself suffered from gout. He presumably realized that, though the disease is not fatal, its torment can drive a man to ruin his liver through excessive resort to the bottle. We show Gilbert’s self-portrait while enduring gout in both feet. The note says “They call it ‘gout’, and I can’t g’out.” (From the Gilbert and Sullivan Collection, Pierpont Morgan Library, courtesy F.W. Wilson.)
A slang term meaning to punish or cause to collapse (115). (Picture a hearty blow to the solar plexus.) Adding “forever” implies killing.
Regulated. In musical terms, “to modulate” means to pass from one key to another. (The Grand Inquisitor can’t resist a little sarcasm.)
A highwayman, or thief, or both. Most often found in mountains or forests.
Pronunciation: CORE-d’-vah
Also known as Cordobá, a name shared by a province in southern Spain and its capital city. The mountains referred to are the Sierra Morena.
A skein is a coil of yarn or thread. The image here is of a somewhat snarled coil, and the allusion is to “the thread of life spun and eventually cut off by the Fates” (273).
A spreading sore. (Can such an affliction benumb?)
Oratory employing careful enunciation and effective gestures, exactly what Gilbert wanted from his performers.
An ancient musical instrument resembling a small harp.
The personification of whimsical thought.
The word has two meanings: (a) to hesitate, and (b) to reduce in size, as happens to a newly deceased body. Another nifty pun.
“All his geese are swans” is an old expression signifying over-optimism (54).
“An insect … in the quiescent stage before it becomes a butterfly” (75). In short, a pupa.
The main waterway that weaves its way in a giant S-shape through Venice.
Scatter coins on the pavement, usually resulting in a mad competition between all those who happen to be on hand.
Pronunciation: ree-AHL-toe
The famous bridge over the Grand Canal at about mid-length.