From the opening night reviews for Gilbert and Sullivan’s “H.M.S. Pinafore” in The Times, May 27, 1878:

The story may be told in the fewest words. A lady, Little Buttercup by name, and a Portsmouth “bumboat woman” by calling, who in her youth has practised baby farming, unburdens her conscience to the effect that she has exchanged in their cradles Captain Corcoran and Ralph Rackstraw, his daughter’s wooer; whereat Sir Joseph withdraws his suit and Josephine becomes the prize of the lucky sailor, who has found a fortune and a bride at the same moment. Other characters of the play are the precipitately wedded, and the curtain drops. This may seem an easy way of constructing a drama. But with Mr. Gilbert a plot is seldom more than a lay figure which he delights in dressing in the fantastic garb of his wit and imagination. In the present instance, also, his dialogue sparkles with the most curious concetti, and vagaries of expression, and while listening to these we hardly become conscious of the absence of any kind of human interest.

Come and see for yourself, tonight at 8 p.m. in Hodgson Concert Hall, as the UGA Opera Ensemble presents Gilbert and Sullivan’s “H.M.S. Pinafore”. Tickets are $15/$5 for students.