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Richard D'Oyly Carte

Richard D'Oyly Carte (3 May 1844 – 3 April 1901) was an English talent agent, theatrical impresario, composer, and hotelier during the latter half of the Victorian era. He built two of London's theatres and a hotel empire, while also establishing an opera company that ran continuously for over a hundred years and a management agency representing some of the most important artists of the day.

Carte started his career working for his father, Richard Carte, in the music publishing and musical instrument manufacturing business. As a young man he conducted and composed music, but he soon turned to promoting the entertainment careers of others through his management agency. Carte believed that a school of wholesome, well-crafted, family-friendly, English comic opera could be as popular as the risqué French works dominating the London musical stage in the 1870s. To that end he brought together the dramatist W. S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan and nurtured their collaboration on a series of thirteen Savoy operas. He founded the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and built the state-of-the-art Savoy Theatre to host the Gilbert and Sullivan operas.

Eight years after opening the Savoy Theatre, Carte built the Savoy Hotel next to it, and later acquired other luxury hotels. In 1891 he erected the Palace Theatre, London (originally called the Royal English Opera House), which he intended to be the home of a new school of English grand opera, but this ambition was not realised beyond the production of a single work by Sullivan, Ivanhoe. Nevertheless, his partnership with Gilbert and Sullivan, and his careful management of their operas and relationship, created a series of works whose success was unprecedented in the history of musical theatre. His opera company, later run by his widow Helen and then by his son, Rupert, and granddaughter, Bridget, promoted those works for more than a century, and they are still performed regularly today.

Early years
Carte was born at his parents' house in Greek Street, Soho, in the West End of London on 3 May 1844; he was the eldest of six children. His father, Richard Carte, was a flautist, and his mother was the former Eliza Jones (1814–1885); they had eloped, to the disappointment of her father, Thomas Jones, a clergyman. Carte was of Welsh and probably Norman ancestry; D'Oyly is a Norman French name which the biographer Arthur Jacobs emphasises was in this case "a forename (not part of a double surname)". To supplement his income as a performer, Carte's father joined the firm of Rudall, Rose & Co., musical instrument makers and music publishers, in 1850. After he became a partner in the business, it changed its name to Rudall, Rose, Carte and Co. and later to Rudall, Carte & Co. The family moved away from Soho when Carte was a boy. He was brought up in their large detached house in Dartmouth Park in north London. His cultured mother exposed her family to art, music and poetry, and young Carte studied the violin and then the flute at an early age. The family spoke French at home two days a week, and his parents often took their children to the theatre.

He was educated at University College School from 1856 to 1860. In January 1861, he achieved First Class level in the matriculation examination for University College London, but did not take up the place; in deference to his parents' wishes he joined his father's business, along with his brother, Henry. As the name Richard Carte was by now well known in, and beyond, the musical profession, Carte dropped the use of his own first name and styled himself "D'Oyly Carte" or, more formally, "R. D'Oyly Carte." He studied music and composed some pieces, which he dedicated to the actress Kate Terry. He also acted in amateur theatricals.

Theatrical beginnings
Between 1868 and 1877, Carte wrote and published the music for several of his own songs and instrumental works, as well as three short comic operas: Doctor Ambrosias – His Secret (1868), Marie (1871), and Happy Hampstead (1876). On tour in 1871 he conducted Cox and Box by Arthur Sullivan and F. C. Burnand, in tandem with English adaptations of two one-act pieces by Offenbach, The Rose of Auvergne and Breaking the Spell, in which Carte's client Selina Dolaro starred. Carte's musical talent would be helpful later in his career, as he was able to audition singers himself from the piano.

During the late 1860s and early 1870s, from within his father's firm in Charing Cross and, by late 1874, from a nearby address in Craig's Court, Carte began to build an operatic, concert and lecture management agency. His two hundred clients eventually included Charles Gounod, Jacques Offenbach, Adelina Patti, Mario, Clara Schumann, Antoinette Sterling, Edward Lloyd, Mr. and Mrs. German Reed, George Grossmith, Matthew Arnold, James McNeill Whistler and Oscar Wilde. Hesketh Pearson said of Carte: "His acute business sense was aided by a frank and agreeable manner: he could not only see where money was to be made but how to make it. He took what other people thought were risks, but he felt were certainties. ... He knew everyone worth knowing ... and his practical judgement was as sure as his sense of artistry."

Founding his opera company
In 1874, Carte leased the Opera Comique, a theatre off the Strand, where he presented Charles Lecocq's new opéra bouffe Giroflé-Girofla, given in French by the company who had premiered the work three months earlier in Brussels. It did poor box-office business, and had to be closed after two weeks. He followed it with a modest success, The Broken Branch, an English adaptation of Gaston Serpette's La branche cassée. Carte announced his ambitions on the front of the programme for the latter: "It is my desire to establish in London a permanent abode for light Opera." The Observer commented, "Mr D'Oyly Carte is not only a skilful manager, but a trained musician, and he appears to have grasped the fact that the public are beginning to become weary of what is known as a genuine opéra bouffe, and are ready to welcome a musical entertainment of a higher order, such as a musician might produce with satisfaction".

Carte later said it was "the scheme of my life" to found a school of high-quality, family-friendly English comic opera, in contrast to the crude burlesques and adaptations of French operettas that dominated the London musical stage at that time. His experience in writing operettas had convinced him that his own creative talents were inadequate for the task. He later wrote to the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, "I envy your position but I could never attain it. If I could be an author like you I would certainly not be a manager. I am simply the tradesman who sells your works of art". Furthermore, in 1874 Carte did not yet have the resources to make his idea into reality, and after his season at the Opera Comique, he terminated his lease.

In 1875 Carte became the business manager of the Royalty Theatre, under the direction of his client, the popular singing actress Selina Dolaro who was the licensee of the theatre and star of its production of Offenbach's La Périchole. To fill out the evening (as long programmes were the fashion in Victorian theatre), he needed another piece. He remembered a libretto for a one-act comic opera that W. S. Gilbert had written and shown to him in 1873, called Trial by Jury. Meanwhile, Sullivan's popular 1867 opera, Cox and Box, had been revived at the Gaiety Theatre in 1874, and Carte had already asked him to write a piece for the Royalty. Carte knew that Gilbert had worked with Sullivan to create Thespis in 1871, and he now suggested that Sullivan could write the music for Trial by Jury. Trial by Jury, a comic treatment of an English courtroom, was an unexpected hit, outrunning La Périchole, and becoming the first step in Carte's scheme to establish a new genre of English comic opera.

In June 1875 the Royalty closed for the summer, and Dolaro took her company on tour. While Trial by Jury and La Périchole were playing at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin in September, Carte met Michael Gunn, a co-owner of the Gaiety. Gunn became a close friend of Carte's, later served as a manager in his theatrical company and was a shareholder and director in his hotel business. Even after the initial production of Trial by Jury Carte continued to produce continental operetta, touring in the summer of 1876 with a repertoire consisting of English adaptations of French opéra bouffe (Offenbach's La Périchole, and La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein, Lecocq's La fille de Madame Angot and Léon Vasseur's La Timbale d'argent), paired with two one-act English after-pieces (Happy Hampstead and Trial by Jury). Carte was the musical director of this travelling company.

In February 1877 Carte, organising a company for a provincial tour of a successful London farce, auditioned a novice actress called Helen Lenoir. He engaged her for a small role, but after a few weeks she left the tour and returned to London where she secured an office post in Carte's agency. She gradually assumed a key role in his business affairs and his personal life. Frank Desprez, the editor of The Era, wrote: "Her character exactly compensated for the deficiencies in his."

Encouraged by the success of Trial by Jury, Carte had been attempting since 1875 to raise money for either a revival of Thespis or a new piece. In 1877 he finally found four backers and formed the "Comedy Opera Company" to produce new works by Gilbert and Sullivan, along with those of other British authors and composers. This allowed Carte to lease the Opera Comique and to give Gilbert and Sullivan firm terms for a new opera. The first comic opera produced by the new company was Gilbert and Sullivan's The Sorcerer in 1877, with a plot involving a tradesmanlike London magician and his patented love potion. Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte were able to select their own cast, instead of using the players under contract to the theatre where the work was produced, as had been the case with their earlier works. They chose talented actors, few of whom were well-known stars; Carte's agency provided many of them. The reception of the piece showed that Carte had been right that there was a promising future in family-friendly English comic opera.

The Sorcerer was followed by H.M.S. Pinafore in 1878. It opened to great enthusiasm but within days of the premiere London experienced an unusually strong and protracted heat wave, and business in the ill-ventilated Opera Comique was badly affected. Takings dropped to £40 a night, and Carte's directors in the Comedy Opera Company advocated cutting their losses and closing the show. After promotional efforts by Carte and Sullivan, who programmed some of the Pinafore music when he conducted a season of promenade concerts at Covent Garden, the opera became a hit. Carte convinced Gilbert and Sullivan that when their original agreement with the Comedy Opera Company expired in July 1879, a business partnership among the three of them would be to their advantage. Each put up £1,000 and formed a new partnership under the name "Mr Richard D'Oyly Carte's Opera Company". Under the partnership agreement, once the expenses of mounting the productions had been deducted, each of the three partners was entitled to one third of the profits.

On 31 July 1879, the last day of their agreement with Carte, the directors of the Comedy Opera Company attempted to repossess the Pinafore set by force during a performance, causing a celebrated fracas. Carte's stagehands managed to ward off their backstage attackers and protect the scenery and props. The Comedy Opera Company opened a rival production of H.M.S. Pinafore in London, but it was not as popular as the D'Oyly Carte production and soon closed. Legal action over the ownership of the rights ended in victory for Carte, Gilbert and Sullivan. From 1 August 1879, the new company, later called the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, became the sole authorised producer of the works of Gilbert and Sullivan.

Early opera successes; property interests
H.M.S. Pinafore was so successful that Carte soon sent two companies out to tour the provinces. The opera ran for 571 performances in London, the second-longest run in musical theatre history up to that time. Over 150 unauthorised productions sprang up in America alone, but because American law then offered no copyright protection to foreigners, Carte, Gilbert and Sullivan were not able to demand royalties from, or to control the artistic content of, these productions. Sullivan commented that in the US there was a belief "that a free and independent American citizen ought not to be robbed of his right of robbing someone else".

To try to counter this copyright piracy and make some money from the popularity of their opera in America, Carte travelled to New York with the authors and the company to present an "authentic" production of Pinafore, beginning in December 1879, as well as American tours. Lenoir made fifteen visits to America in the 1880s and 1890s to promote Carte's interests, superintending arrangements for American productions and tours of each of the new Gilbert and Sullivan operas. Beginning with Pinafore, Carte licensed the J. C. Williamson company to produce the works in Australia and New Zealand.

In an effort to head off unauthorised American productions of their next opera, The Pirates of Penzance, Carte and his partners opened it in New York on 31 December 1879, prior to its 1880 London premiere. They hoped to forestall further "piracy" by establishing the authorised production and tours in America before others could copy it and by delaying publication of the score and libretto. They succeeded in keeping for themselves the direct profits of the venture, but they tried without success for many years to control the American performance copyrights over their operas. The Pirates was an immediate hit in New York, and later London, becoming one of the most popular Gilbert and Sullivan operas. To secure the British copyright, Lenoir arranged an ad hoc performance at the Royal Bijou Theatre, Paignton, Devon, by the smaller of Carte's two Pinafore touring companies, the afternoon before the New York premiere.

The next Gilbert and Sullivan opera, Patience, opened at the Opera Comique in April 1881 and was another big success, usurping Pinafore's position as the longest running piece in the series with the second-longest run in musical theatre history to that date. Patience satirised the self-indulgent aesthetic movement of the 1870s and '80s in England. To popularise the opera in America, in 1882 Carte sent one of the artistes under his management, the young poet Oscar Wilde, on a lecture tour to explain to Americans what the aesthetic movement was about. Carte told an interviewer at that time that he had fifteen theatrical companies and performers touring simultaneously in Europe, America and Australia.

Carte had been planning for several years to build a new theatre to promote English comic opera and, in particular, the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. With profits from the Gilbert and Sullivan operas and his concert and lecture agency, he bought property along the Strand in 1880 with frontage onto the Thames Embankment, where he built the Savoy Theatre in 1881. It was a state-of-the-art facility, setting a new standard for technology, comfort and decor. It was the first public building in the world to be lit entirely by electric lights and seated nearly 1,300 people (compared to the Opera Comique's 862).

Patience was the first production at the new theatre, transferring there on 10 October 1881. The first generator proved too small to power the whole building, and though the entire front of house was electrically lit, the stage was lit by gas until 28 December 1881. At that performance, Carte stepped on stage and broke a glowing lightbulb before the audience to demonstrate the safety of the new technology. The Times concluded that the theatre "is admirably adapted for its purpose, its acoustic qualities are excellent, and all reasonable demands of comfort and taste are complied with." Carte and his manager, George Edwardes (later famous as manager of the Gaiety Theatre), introduced several innovations at the theatre including free programme booklets, the orderly "queue" system with numbered tickets for the pit and gallery (an American idea), tea served at the interval and a policy of no tipping for cloakroom or other services. Daily expenses at the theatre were about half the possible takings from ticket sales. The last eight of Gilbert and Sullivan's comic operas were premiered at the Savoy, and all their operas came to be known as Savoy operas.

The Savoy Hotel, designed by the architect Thomas Edward Collcutt, opened in 1889. Financed by profits from The Mikado, it was the first hotel lit by electric lights and the first with electric lifts. In the 1890s, under its famous manager, César Ritz, and chef Auguste Escoffier, it became a well-known luxury hotel and would generate more income and contribute more to the D'Oyly Carte fortunes than any other enterprise, including the opera companies. Carte later acquired and refurbished Claridge's (1893), The Grand Hotel in Rome (1896), Simpson's-in-the-Strand (1898) and The Berkeley (1900).

Peak years for the opera company
During the years when the Gilbert and Sullivan operas were being written Carte also produced operas and plays by other writing teams, as well as other works to fill the Savoy Theatre in between new operas. Many of these were companion pieces to the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. Others were new full-length pieces either for the Savoy or for Carte's touring companies, which played the Gilbert and Sullivan operas and the new works extensively. Carte and Lenoir also continued to run his management agency. As an example of their level of activity, an 1881 souvenir programme commemorating the 250th performance of Patience in London and its 100th performance in New York records that, in addition to these two productions of Patience, Carte was simultaneously managing many other projects. These included two companies touring with Patience, two touring with other Gilbert and Sullivan operas, one touring with the operetta Olivette (co-produced with Charles Wyndham), one with Claude Duval in America, a production of Youth running at a New York theatre, a lecture tour by Archibald Forbes (a war correspondent) and productions of Patience, Pirates, Claude Duval and Billee Taylor in association with J. C. Williamson in Australia, among other things.

Carte also introduced the practice of licensing amateur theatrical societies to present works for which he held the rights, increasing the works' popularity and the sales of scores and libretti, as well as the rental of band parts. This had an important influence on amateur theatre in general. Cellier and Bridgeman wrote in 1914 that, prior to the creation of the Savoy operas, amateur actors were treated with contempt by professionals. After the formation of amateur Gilbert and Sullivan companies licensed to perform the operas, professionals recognised that the amateur societies "support the culture of music and the drama. They are now accepted as useful training schools for the legitimate stage, and from the volunteer ranks have sprung many present-day favourites." Cellier and Bridgeman attributed the rise in quality and reputation of the amateur groups largely to "the popularity of, and infectious craze for performing, the Gilbert and Sullivan operas". The National Operatic and Dramatic Association was founded in 1899. It reported, in 1914, that nearly 200 British societies were producing Gilbert and Sullivan operas that year.

After Patience, Carte produced Iolanthe, which opened in 1882. During its run, in February 1883, he signed a five-year partnership agreement with Gilbert and Sullivan, obliging them to create new operas for him upon six months' notice. Sullivan had not intended to immediately write a new work with Gilbert, but he suffered a serious financial loss when his stockbroker went bankrupt in November 1882 and felt the long-term contract necessary for his security. The Gilbert scholar Andrew Crowther comments, "Effectively, [the contract] made [Gilbert and Sullivan] Carte's employees – a situation which created its own resentments." The partnership's next opera, Princess Ida, opened in January 1884. Carte soon saw that it was running weakly at the box office and invoked the agreement to call upon his partners to write a new opera. The musical establishment was continually exhorting Sullivan to abandon comic opera in favour of serious music, and after he was knighted in 1883, the pressure increased. He soon regretted signing the five-year contract. In March 1884, Sullivan told Carte that "it is impossible for me to do another piece of the character of those already written by Gilbert and myself."

During this conflict and others during the 1880s, Carte and Helen Lenoir frequently worked to smooth over the partners' differences using a mixture of friendship and business acumen. Sullivan asked to be released from the partnership on several occasions. Nevertheless, Carte was able to coax eight comic operas out of his partners between 1879 and 1896. When Princess Ida closed after a comparatively short run of nine months, for the first time in the partnership's history, a new opera was not ready. Gilbert first suggested a plot in which people fell in love against their wills after taking a magic lozenge – a scenario that Sullivan had previously rejected. Gilbert eventually came up with a new idea and began work in May 1884.

Carte produced the first revival of The Sorcerer, together with Trial by Jury, and matinees of The Pirates of Penzance played by a cast of children, while he waited for his partners to finish writing the new work. This became the partnership's most successful opera, The Mikado, which opened in March 1885. The piece satirised British institutions by setting them in a fictional Japan and took advantage of the Victorian craze for the exotic and "picturesque" Far East. The Mikado became the partnership's longest-running hit, lasting for 672 performances at the Savoy Theatre, and supplanting Patience as the second-longest-running work of musical theatre up to that time. It was extraordinarily popular in the US and worldwide and remains the most frequently performed Savoy Opera. The partnership's next opera was Ruddigore, which opened in January 1887. The piece, though a financial success, was a relative disappointment after the extraordinary run of The Mikado. When Ruddigore closed after 288 performances over nine months, Carte mounted revivals of earlier Gilbert and Sullivan operas at the Savoy for almost a year. After another attempt by Gilbert to persuade Sullivan to set a "lozenge plot", Gilbert met his collaborator half way by writing a serio-comic plot for The Yeomen of the Guard, which premiered in October 1888. The opera ran for over a year, with strong New York and touring productions. This was a happy time for Carte, with a long-running opera, new marriage and new hotel and opera house under construction. When Carte asked his partners for a new work, Sullivan again expressed reluctance to write another comic opera, asking if Gilbert would write a "dramatic work on a larger musical scale". Gilbert declined but offered a compromise that Sullivan ultimately accepted: the two would write a light opera for the Savoy, and at the same time, Sullivan could work on a grand opera that Carte would produce at a new theatre he was planning to build to present British grand opera. The new comic opera was The Gondoliers, which opened in December 1889 and became one of the partnership's greatest successes, with an initial run of 554 performances.

During these years, Carte was not just the manager of the theatre. He was a full participant in the producing partnership with Gilbert and Sullivan, involved in casting and finding designers; in charge of publicity; directing and hiring designers for the non-Gilbert works, including the many companion pieces (sometimes with the help of assistants); and casting, directing and rehearsing the touring companies, among other duties. According to Henry Lytton, "Mr. Carte was a great stage manager. He could take in the details of a scene with one sweep of his eagle eye and say unerringly just what was wrong." The quality of Carte's productions created a national and international taste for them, and he sent touring companies throughout the British provinces, to America (generally managed by Helen), Europe and elsewhere. Queen Victoria honoured the company by calling for a Royal Command Performance of The Gondoliers at Windsor Castle in 1891. Bernard Shaw, writing in The World in October 1893, said: "Those who are old enough to compare the Savoy performances with those of the dark ages, taking into account the pictorial treatment of the fabrics and colors on the stage, the cultivation and intelligence of the choristers, the quality of the orchestra, and the degree of artistic good breeding, so to speak, expected from the principals, best know how great an advance has been made by Mr. D'Oyly Carte."

Later years
On 22 April 1890, during the run of The Gondoliers, Gilbert discovered that maintenance expenses for the theatre, including a new £500 carpet for the front lobby of the theatre, were being charged to the partnership instead of borne by Carte. Gilbert angrily confronted Carte, but Carte refused to reconsider the accounts. Even though the amount of the charge was not great, Gilbert felt that it was a moral issue involving Carte's integrity, and he could not look past it. Gilbert stormed out and wrote to Sullivan that "I left him with the remark that it was a mistake to kick down the ladder by which he had risen". Helen Carte wrote that Gilbert had addressed Carte "in a way that I should not have thought you would have used to an offending menial." Matters deteriorated further, and Gilbert brought a lawsuit. Sullivan sided with Carte, who was building the Royal English Opera House, the inaugural production of which was to be Sullivan's forthcoming grand opera. Gilbert won the dispute and felt vindicated, but his actions had been hurtful to his partners, and the partnership disbanded.

Carte's first production at the Royal English Opera House was of Sullivan's only grand opera, Ivanhoe, which opened in January 1891. It played for an initial run of 155 performances, a record for an opera. When it finally closed in July, Carte had no new work ready to play at the opera house, and so it had to close. The opera house re-opened in November 1891 with André Messager's La Basoche at first alternating in repertory with Ivanhoe, and then La Basoche played alone, closing in January 1892. Carte again had no new opera to present at the house, and the venture soon failed. Sir Henry Wood, who as young man had been répétiteur for the production, recalled in his autobiography, "If D'Oyly Carte had had a repertory of six operas instead of only one, I believe he would have established English opera in London for all time. Towards the end of the run of Ivanhoe I was already preparing The Flying Dutchman with Eugène Oudin in the name part. He would have been superb. However, plans were altered and the Dutchman was shelved." Carte leased the theatre to Sarah Bernhardt for a season and finally abandoned the project. He sold the opera house at a loss to the impresario Sir Augustus Harris. It was then converted into a music hall, the Palace Theatre of Varieties, and later became the Palace Theatre.

Because of the carpet quarrel, Gilbert had vowed to write no more for the Savoy. When The Gondoliers closed in 1891, Carte needed new authors and composers to write works for the Savoy Theatre. He turned to old friends George Dance, Frank Desprez and Edward Solomon for his next piece, The Nautch Girl, which ran for a satisfying 200 performances in 1891–92. Carte then revived Solomon and Sydney Grundy's The Vicar of Bray, which ran through the summer of 1892. Next came Grundy and Sullivan's Haddon Hall, which held the stage until April 1893. While Carte presented new pieces and revivals at the Savoy, his touring companies continued to play throughout Britain and in America. In 1894, for example, Carte had four companies touring Britain and one playing in America.

Gilbert's aggressive, though successful, legal action had embittered Carte and Sullivan, but the partnership had been so profitable that Carte and his wife eventually sought to reunite the author and composer. After several attempts by the Cartes, the reconciliation finally came through the efforts of Tom Chappell, who published the sheet music to their operas. In 1893, Gilbert and Sullivan produced their penultimate collaboration, Utopia, Limited. While that was being prepared, Carte staged Jane Annie, by J. M. Barrie and Arthur Conan Doyle, with music by Ernest Ford. Despite the popularity of Barrie and Conan Doyle, the show was a flop, closing after only 51 performances.

Utopia was Carte's most expensive production to date, but it ran for a comparatively disappointing 245 performances, until June 1894. Carte then played first Mirette, by Messager, then The Chieftain, by F. C. Burnand and Sullivan. These ran for 102 and 97 performances, respectively. The company then toured the London suburbs, and the Savoy was leased to other managements until November, when Carte presented a revival of The Mikado. This was followed in 1896 by The Grand Duke, which ran for 123 performances and was Gilbert and Sullivan's only financial failure. The Gondoliers turned out to be Gilbert and Sullivan's last big hit, and after The Grand Duke, the two men never collaborated again. At the Savoy, Carte produced His Majesty (1897), The Grand Duchess of Gerolstein (1897), The Beauty Stone (1898) and The Lucky Star (1899), as well as revivals of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas.

Though the 1890s brought Carte more disappointments than hits in the theatre, his hotel business prospered and grew. He acquired Simpson's-in-the-Strand and Claridge's Hotel, both of which he entirely rebuilt. There was one grave setback, in 1897, when he had to dismiss his manager, Ritz, and his star chef, Escoffier, for financial misconduct. Carte's choice as successor to Ritz was George Reeves-Smith, manager and part-owner of the Berkeley Hotel. To secure his services, Carte bought the Berkeley in 1900 and promoted Reeves-Smith to be managing director of the whole Savoy Group. Carte had used the same method, a year earlier, to secure a new maître d'hôtel. He was determined to engage M. Joseph, proprietor of the Marivaux Restaurant in Paris, then at the height of its fame. Carte was seriously ill, but he insisted on being carried to the boat-train. In Paris he bought the Marivaux and returned with Joseph to the Savoy.

Throughout the later 1890s, Carte's health was in decline, and Helen assumed more and more of the responsibilities for the opera company. She profitably managed the theatre and the provincial touring companies. In 1894, Carte had hired his son, Rupert, as an assistant. While Carte was ill, in 1897, Rupert assisted Mrs Carte and Gilbert with the first revival of The Yeomen of the Guard at the Savoy. The Savoy put on a number of shows for comparatively short runs during this period, including Sullivan's The Beauty Stone, which ran for only 50 performances, in 1898. In 1899, Carte finally had a new success with Sullivan and Basil Hood's The Rose of Persia, which ran for 213 performances. Neither Carte nor Sullivan lived to see the production of the next piece by Hood, The Emerald Isle, for which Edward German completed Sullivan's unfinished score.

Personal life
Carte was married twice. His first wife was Blanche Julia Prowse (1853–1885), the daughter of William Prowse, a piano manufacturer, music publisher and booking agent. As a teenager, she had participated in amateur theatricals with Carte. They married in 1870 and had two sons, Lucas (1872–1907) and Rupert. Blanche died of pneumonia in 1885, and in 1888, Carte married his assistant, Helen Lenoir. Their wedding took place in the Savoy Chapel, with Arthur Sullivan as the best man. Rupert received training in an accounting firm and then became his father's assistant in 1894. Lucas, who was not involved in the family businesses, became a barrister. He was appointed Private Secretary to Lord Chief Justice Charles Russell in 1899 in connection with the Venezuelan boundary arbitration in Paris. He contracted tuberculosis of which he died at the age of 34.

Carte's London house was at the Adelphi, not far from the Savoy. Passionate about the visual arts as well as the performing arts, Carte invited his friend, the artist James McNeill Whistler, to decorate the house. Whistler had the entire billiard room painted the colour of the billiard cloth, and elsewhere painted his favourite yellow with his own hand. Equally enthusiastic for technological innovation, Carte installed a lift, the first in a private house in England. Around 1890, he bought a small island in the River Thames, between Weybridge and Shepperton, called Folly Eyot, which he renamed D'Oyly Carte Island. He wanted to use the island as an annex to his new Savoy Hotel, but the local authorities refused to grant him a drinks licence for the property. Instead, he built Eyot House, a large house and garden on the island, that he used as a residence and where he entertained guests. In later years, Carte displayed his macabre sense of humour by keeping a crocodile on the island.

Death and legacy
Carte died at his London home from dropsy and heart disease in 1901, just short of his 57th birthday. He is buried in the churchyard of St Andrew's in Fairlight, East Sussex, near his parents' graves. A memorial service was held at the Chapel Royal of the Savoy, where a memorial stained glass window was later dedicated to him. He left an estate valued at £250,000.

Carte was instrumental in bringing the British theatre from its low status in the mid-Victorian age to a position of respectable eminence, with knighthoods for actors, such as Henry Irving, and for dramatists, including Gilbert. Bernard Shaw wrote of Carte's theatrical legacy, "Mr D'Oyly Carte founded a new school of English comic opera; raised operatic inscenation to the rank of a fine art; and finally built a new English Opera House and made a magnificent effort to do for English grand opera what he had done for comic opera." In Carte's obituary, The Times noted, "By his refined taste he raised the reputation of the mise en scène of the Savoy operas to a very high pitch. He set a high standard". Beyond this, however, Carte's influence, through the production of the Savoy operas, heavily influenced the course of the development of modern musical theatre.

Carte was also a prime mover in making hotels respectable and respected: in the words of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: "Led by the prince of Wales [the Savoy] became the meeting place for London high society and the nouveaux riches of the British empire.... [The] food and the ambience lured people from the clubs to dine in public and give great parties there. It allowed ladies, hitherto fearful of dining in public, to be seen in full regalia in the Savoy dining and supper rooms."

Carte left the theatre, opera company, hotels and his other business interests to Helen. Her London and touring companies continued to present the Savoy Operas in Britain and overseas. In 1901 she leased the Savoy Theatre to William Greet, overseeing his management of a revival of Iolanthe and several new comic operas. Rupert became chairman of the Savoy Hotel by 1903, which Helen continued to own. In late 1906, Helen staged a Gilbert and Sullivan repertory season at the Savoy Theatre. The season, and the following one, which were both directed by Gilbert, earned excellent reviews and sold well, revitalising the company. After the second repertory season concluded in 1909 the company did not perform in London again until 1919, only touring throughout Britain during that time.

At her death in 1913, Helen passed the family businesses to Carte's son, Rupert. He maintained the hotel business, disposing of the Grand Hotel in Rome, but expanding the group in London. The Savoy Group remained under the control of the Carte family and its associates until 1994. Carte's hotels have remained among the most prestigious in London, with the London Evening Standard calling the Savoy "London's most famous hotel" in 2009.

Rupert D'Oyly Carte refreshed the opera company's productions and added London seasons, beginning in 1919, as well as provincial and foreign tours. In 1948 Rupert died, leaving a strong company to his daughter Bridget D'Oyly Carte. However, the rising costs of mounting professional light opera without any government support eventually became too much for the company. Bridget was forced to close the company in 1982. Nevertheless, the Gilbert and Sullivan operas continue to be produced frequently today throughout the English-speaking world and beyond, and Carte's vision of wholesome light operas that celebrate Great Britain endures.

title: Richard D'Oyly Carte


text:
Talk:New Tribal Revolution

This reads really well now.
Maybe should make some mention of the idea of the "noble savage" which the new tribalists revived?

However, there's a sociological basis for these tribal models if you look at Daniel Quinn's work. I believe at one point the book "Ishmael" won some major contest or award for alternative social evolution models (alternatives to "eat the rich" that is). I can't find the reference - I'll look for it.

This article does not read well because it does not explain what "leavers" and "takers" are; it does not provide any context for these terms (e.g., who uses the terms and why, who does not use the terms and why).

By the way, although a clever and thoughtful writer, Quinn ignores most anthropology, sociology, geography, and human ecology of the past twenty-five years; it is not by any means authoritative or accurate SR

- No one said Quinn was authoritative or accurate - this is just a description of what "new tribalists" are. As to "leavers" they are defined more or less as Quinn's followers, while "takers" are defined as those from "Mother culture" - Quinn's name for the nation-state society of capitalism and representative democracy and etc. I think this is quite clear in the entry.

It's a bit terse, though, and if you think it needs more space, give it more.

I think the terms "leaver" and "taker" are confined more or less to Quinn's followers - and that trying to ascribe them more broadly than that may not be accurate. But if you can find for example instances of Greens or Quakers or Sufis or indigenous peoples using them to self-describe, by all means, quote 'em.

I'd say that if you find more than a couple of these, make a new entry for "leavers" and describe their own idea of what "takers" are there... as I doubt anyone voluntarily describes themself as a "taker"

I've edited this heavily. Much of the information in it was not entirely accurate, and I have expanded each of the criticisms from a single phrase to a full sub-section exploring the nature of the criticism, and new tribalists' response to that criticism. I also worked on some information about the "Noble Savage" The usage of the terms "Taker," "Leaver" and "Mother Culture" were entirely wrong. These terms are, indeed, entirely confined to Quinn's "followers" (for lack of a better word), but then, so is the term "New tribalist," though I've never heard this usage outside of this article. Quinn's "followers" use the term, "New Tribal Revolution," or more commonly, the abbreviation, "NTR." In fact, most of Quinn's "followers" do refer to themselves as "Takers," not out of pride, but to acknowledge the stumbling blocks of their acculturation.

Ishmael won the Turner Tomorrow Fellowship in 1998, recieving the single largest cash prize ever awarded to a work of fiction. That's probably the award you're thinking of.

I also need to disagree with "SR" on Ishmael's accuracy; I've studied anthropology, sociology, geography and human ecology intensely for several years specifically to put these claims to the test, and while I've found several details that were off, the central tenets still seem to be sound. At worst, we can only say that Quinn's accuracy is ... contested.

Jason Godesky

I agree with Jason, I too have studied anthropology, sociology, geography and human ecology -mostly in regards to the ideas directly discussed in Quinns works- and have found his works to be, as Jason said, sound. I have not edited this page, but I feel strongly that someone needs to re-work this sentence "Quinn's willingness to accept wide-spread starvation..." Quinn has made it perfectly clear that he does not have a solution to the food race, and while people love to put words and ideas into his mouth, here is a link to a response he himself has to this accusation here: http://www.ishmael.com/Interaction/QandA/Detail.CFM?Record=23 and here: http://www.ishmael.com/Interaction/QandA/Detail.CFM?Record=449 Because this is such a common misconception among people who read ishmael, as a joke my friends and I once begged Quinn to write, "Let Them Starve" in a copy of The Story of B. Quinn refused to do this even as a joke. That's how serious he is about this issue.

Urban Scout

______________________________________________________________________________________________

People argue? Seems to be some philosophical indecision about this material.... I have read about 4 of Quinn's books. Ishmael, Story of B, The Holy, and My Ishmael. I have been a philosophy buff for quite some time because the ideology of Philosophy is quite like putting a puzzle together except exactly the opposite, in our society the spoils go to those that can find the loop holes in someone else's reason. Here is my point: Quinn is not attempting a philosophic work in any regard. I thought he was which is why I began reading the books in the first place. He's simply expressing his thoughts, which are very well formed, and leaving it up to others to interrpret as they choose. As Ishmael says there is no right way for any group of people to live. It's the simple idea that those who live in a way that benefits nature benefits them, and to do such things will also benefit the survival of a community (give support get support). It is pretty obvious to most of us something went wrong in our world some time ago and I think it's brave of Quinn to point it out in a way that could be a starting point for some. Throwing around buzz words and trying to crticize the thoughts as being without philosophical integrity is part of the blah blah blah or bullshit that Quinn is attemting to avoid. Simply put lets stop destroying things and start nurturing other things and chances are we will be happier and healthier for it... end of story. No need to over intellectulize the whole thing. Thanks for reading this. Steph —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.15.87.226 (talk) 21:19, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Problem with the lead
Who are these people? Are they academic theorists? Are they off living on communes? Where do they come from? What country(s) or state(s) are they in? Is this a branch of sociology? It is quite disconcerting to read an article and not know what its subject is. Jd2718 02:04, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

 * I agree this page suffers from fuzziness. Try neo-Tribalism for what I think is a clearer (and better referenced) article on a similar subject. Mjk2357 19:02, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

What is this article about?
I've tagged the article as "confusing." It really deserves worse. At no point does the article explain what a "new tribalist" is. I am assuming the most likely answer is some category of navel-gazing academic. Who else would just assume the rest of the world knows who they are? But it needs to be stated up front. Is it a subset of New World anthropologists? Is it a trend in European sociology? This needs to be addressed. Jd2718 13:55, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

 * "New tribalists are radical adherents of Neo-Tribalism. They propose a New Tribal Revolution outlined in the Ishmael series by Daniel Quinn. New tribalists believe that the tribe fulfills an important role in human life, and that the dissolution of tribalism with the spread of civilization has come to threaten the very survival of the species. New tribalists seek to mimic indigenous peoples by organizing their own "tribes" based on underlying principles gleaned from ethnology and anthropological fieldwork."

 * What's unclear about that? JasonGodesky 15:31, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

 * You've just retyped the opening of the article. I've read the article, and I still don't know what a new tribalist is. Are they Americans? Do they actually build these villages and move into them? Do they make fantasy websites about made up villages? Are they amateur anthropologists? Are they a fringe group among academic sociologists? A clue. Can we have a clue? Jd2718 16:07, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

 * Actually, I copied and pasted it. I'm not sure how much more of a clue you could ask for.  Some are Americans, some aren't; it's not restricted to any particular nationality.  The case is premised on anthropology, and some have a background in anthropology, but others don't.  Some are academics, some aren't.  Mostly, they're people who read Ishmael, and think the New Tribal Revolution is a good idea.  They think tribes are important.  Some try to make such tribes, others don't get very far past planning.  The first paragraph as it stands gives you a lot more than a clue, it gives you a very solid statement of precisely what they are.  I'm not sure how it could be any clearer than that, and I'm really not sure where your confusion is coming from.  Are you simply assuming they must be limited to some geographical area or intellectual discipline?  If so, the confusion lies in your assumption, not in the article.  JasonGodesky 00:58, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * When, where, who, how many? If they are everywhere (seems doubtful), then the article should say so. If they are primarily in North America (sounds likely) then that should be stated. These tribes, do the New Tribalists move into physical communities? When did this start happening? Where? Are they all white? Are they all atheists?
 * Look, you fellows might read the article and say "Yup, that's us!" But as it's written, I doubt any outsider knows what it being discussed. Jd2718 12:26, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * These "specifics" you're asking for simply don't relate. This is the first paragraph for the "Christian" article: "A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, a monotheistic[1] religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as presented in the New Testament.[2] Christians believe Jesus to be the Son of God and the Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament."  This is actually less clear, by your terms, than the first paragraph of this article.  When, where, who, how many?  Are they all white?  North American (sounds likely)?  Do they live in physical communities together, or not?  Is it some sub-category of navel-gazing academics (seems so, since they're the only people who would think this is clear)?
 * I'd say it probably is a primarily First World phenomenon, but it's not just North American--it's through Europe and Australia as well. Some physical communities exist; others are just being planned.  It's been happening since Ishmael was published, which the article already indicates.  They're not all white, and they're not all atheists.  There's no one racial or religious identification you could apply that would hold.  This is only confusing if you really, really try to make it so. JasonGodesky 15:19, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Again, someone who doesn't already know what you are talking about will still not after reading the article. The Christian article is specifically about the term "Christian," gives the history of the term, and the modern usage. It is well-linked. The reader leaves knowing something about the term, how it is used differently in different cultures, where it was first used, etc. Your article is about? a term? a group of people? It lacks context. Jd2718 15:39, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * So you agree that the "Christian" article adequately defines what a "Christian" is. It's a term referring to a group of people, and it tells you the defining criteria for that group (belief in Jesus).  So what, specifically, would you like to see in this article?  The defining criterion here is adherence to the "New Tribal Revolution" proposed in Ishmael.  All other criteria vary, just like among Christians.  So, given that, what would you like to see in the article that isn't already there?  I don't see what you want that isn't already there.  You seem to want to have a superset, like "U.S. citizens" or "sociologists," but no such superset would be accurate; they're not any such subset.  They're a group defined by a common belief.  So, what do you want to see that isn't already there? JasonGodesky 16:56, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't approve or disapprove of the Christian article, but it has context; we know what the subject is.
 * When do they first appear?
 * Where do they first appear?
 * Are they called any other names?
 * When do they first move into their own communities?
 * How many eventually move into their own communities?
 * How many are there?
 * Are their numbers growing? shrinking? stable?
 * Any wierd practices? (should probably say "unusual")
 * The ideology doesn't float in the aether. There is historical, social, political context. What we really need is a knowledgeable non-supporter to provide some of this. Jd2718 17:05, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
 * When do they first appear?
 * 1991 (the year Ishmael was published)
 * Where do they first appear?
 * There's no one geographical location that you could point to accurately; it appears whenever and wherever someone reads Ishmael
 * Are they called any other names?
 * Frankly, they're not even called "new tribalists." I raised this objection elsewhere; really there should be a "New Tribal Revolution" article and that's it.  That's the only term that's actually used outside of Wikipedia.
 * When do they first move into their own communities?
 * When such communities are formed. There's no set pattern to this.  They form the communities, and that sequence is unique to each community.
 * How many eventually move into their own communities?
 * Nobody really knows; it's a minority, though, that much seems certain.
 * How many are there?
 * Nobody really knows. Ishmael's been translated into 20 languages, and has sold quite well.  Not everyone who reads it becomes a "New Tribalist," of course, but it's also a book that's often shared widely, so each sale probably ultimately represents one "New Tribalist."
 * Are their numbers growing? shrinking? stable?
 * Growing, but nobody knows how much.
 * Any wierd practices? (should probably say "unusual")
 * Not really; at least, none that are systematic. By the nature of their beliefs, they tend to be ecological, have an interest in animism, etc., but none of these are entirely universal.
 * But note, all of these answers are already implicit in the existing first paragraph. Most are simply irrelevant or unknown.  No, it doesn't float in the aether, but the historical influences have already been delineated in Neo-Tribalism (though, I think, poorly), and in Ishmael.  So, all the context you're asking for either (a) is already provided, or (b) doesn't exist because you're trying to squeeze this into some pigeon hole it simply doesn't fit.  It's just people who think Quinn had a good idea--no more, no less. JasonGodesky 03:43, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Objectivity and Writing Issues
This article appears to have some serious objectivity issues, specifically in the criticism section. The bold font used for the "all" in "Quinn's understanding of the relationship between food supply and human population is not accepted by all biologists or demographers." seems to suggest the majority of biologists and demographers do in fact support Quinn, while the minority do not. While I believe the majority in fact would not support Quinn, either assertion demands some sort of reference. At the very least, it should not be bolded and perhaps be reworded as to be less ambiguously neutral.

The assertion that people who encounter tribalism either become a Tribalist or "reject it and forget about it" is also colloquial and vaguely dismissive.

The following statement, Historians and anthropologists who study Nearctic and Neotropic peoples are divided. Almost all are very sympathetic to the situation of indigenous peoples, and admire their cultures to varying degrees. Many of these scholars, in the Rousseauian tradition of the "Noble Savage", prefer these societies to European societies of the same period. Some speculate this may be due to the idiosyncratic convictions of these same historians, which may have a basis in personal cultural doubts.

is in serious needs of references or should be deleted entirely

In short, there appears to be a consistent use of ambiguity and idiosyncratic writing style in this article that affects to have the article support New Tribalism, rather than simply describe it, its critics, and Tribalism's refutations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Swonga (talk • contribs) 10:08, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Taker vs. Leaver section
I'm perfectly aware many editors watching this page may have a hair trigger when it comes to this page. Therefore, to avoid an edit war I'm posting here first. The description of Takers and Leavers is wrong and should be modified to describe the difference as those who Take control from the hands of the gods vs. those who Leave control in the hands of the gods. This will match the actual reference by Quinn in Ishmael. It is also my intention to remove the previously mentioned bias from this section. Chipstata (talk) 12:40, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

 * On Second thought perhaps this section should just be removed as this article is NOT about Ishmael or Daniel Quinn and a description of Takers and Leavers is unnecessary to an understanding of "New tribalists" Chipstata (talk) 12:17, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

 * Something that says, early and clearly, what these people are, would be quite welcome. As you can see above, it is not easy to get a straight answer from a supporter. Jd2718 (talk) 01:32, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

 * I'm removing the Taker vs. Leaver and Mother Culture sections as unnecessary to a description of "New Tribalists" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chipstata (talk • contribs) 13:18, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Merge with Neo-tribalism
It's been suggested that this article be merged with Neo-tribalism with a subsection about "new tribalist" from the Quinn perspective. I agree with merging the articles. Chipstata (talk) 13:51, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Criticism
why is Criticism the first section... this seems quite not-NPOV 86.127.186.205 (talk) 19:15, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Not to mention it is the bulk of the article. --68.59.42.247 (talk) 03:39, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

And not to mention that the grammar in it is astoundingly bad and inconsistent. 74.215.100.230 (talk) 22:25, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

In reading over the criticism section, yet again, I don't see how it contributes to an understanding of the subject. I'm planning to delete the entire section. Any discussion? Chipstata (talk) 13:11, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Chipstata, frankly i disagree, you removed the sections that had anything to do with the mother culture/take-leaver sections and now you propose to remove everything else. Most of the criticism seems fairly legitimate arguments. I would be inclined to criticism and see expanding on the topic or pherhaps a complete merge into the ishmeal series article. Weaponbb7 (talk) 14:04, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

I didn't realize Wikipedia was the appropriate place for debate on the validity of an idea. My mistake Chipstata (talk) 16:00, 18 February 2010 (UTC)
 * debate no, criticism yes Weaponbb7 (talk) 16:16, 18 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I can find no reference to support any of this information. Until someone can show reference this section does not belong here.  This material would be better used as reference in explaining "weasel words" Chipstata (talk) 13:48, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
 * the whole thing is unreferenced, dont delete legit critiicsm becuase it is unreferenced, especially when the whole thing is unreferenced. Weaponbb7 (talk) 14:20, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
 * If you are truly NPOV then i advise adding in a fall summary of the therory proposed by quinn. The statements by several editors seem to indicate some sort of cult following as well as some webistes out there. Weaponbb7 (talk) 03:54, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

 * If you can find even one reference in writing, other then this article, which applies these criticisms to people who identify as New Tribalist, then it belongs here. Until then, it does not apply, and YOU have to PROVE that it does or it is simply your Point Of View.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chipstata (talk • contribs) 13:03, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Removed adherents of Neotribalsim
its nothing to do with neotribalism

Move To New Tribal Revolution
New tribalists → New Tribal Revolution — This page seems much more about the thery of a New Tribal Revolution than the adherents. Weaponbb7 (talk) 02:09, 18 February 2010 (UTC) Having searched "New Tribalist" on the internet i can not find any sources that talk of anything like this | This search on Feb 17 2010 shows on the first three pages of hits it either is a mirror of this article or uses this article as a reference. I did a seach of both new tribalism and New Tribalist in "CSA Illumina sociological abstract data base" seems to show no use of the term in reference to this topic. Weaponbb7 (talk) 02:09, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. I plan to delete the bulk of the article, the criticism section, as it is poorly written, unsourced, and does not contribute to an understanding of the idea of a "New Tribal Revolution" Chipstata (talk) 13:16, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

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title: Talk:New Tribal Revolution