UTOPIA LIMITED
OR
THE FLOWERS OF PROGRESS
Music by Sir Arthur Sullivan
Libretto by William S. Gilbert
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
King Paramount, the First (King of Utopia)
Scaphio and Phantis (Judges of the Utopian Supreme Court)
Tarara (The Public Exploder)
Calynx (The Utopian Vice-Chamberlain)
Imported Flowers of Progress:
Lord Dramaleigh (a British Lord Chamberlain)
Captain Fitzbattleaxe (First Life Guards)
Captain Sir Edward Corcoran, K.C.B. (of the Royal Navy)
Mr. Goldbury (a company promoter; afterwards Comptroller of the Utopian
Household)
Sir Bailey Barre, Q.C., M.P.
Mr. Blushington (of the County Council)
The Princess Zara (eldest daughter of King Paramount)
The Princesses Nekaya and Kalyba (her Younger Sisters)
The Lady Sophy (their English Gouvernante)
Utopian Maidens:
Salata
Melene
Phylla
A Utopian Palm Grove
Throne Room in King Paramount's Palace
First produced at the Savoy Theatre on October 7, 1893.
ACT I.
OPENING CHORUS.
In lazy languor--motionless,
We lie and dream of nothingness;
For visions come
From Poppydom
Direct at our command:
Or, delicate alternative,
In open idleness we live,
With lyre and lute
And silver flute,
The life of Lazyland.
SOLO - Phylla.
The song of birds
In ivied towers;
The rippling play
Of waterway;
The lowing herds;
The breath of flowers;
The languid loves
Of turtle doves--
These simply joys are all at hand
Upon thy shores, O Lazyland!
(Enter Calynx)
Calynx: Good news! Great news! His Majesty's eldest daughter,
Princess Zara, who left our shores five years since to go to
England--the greatest, the most powerful, the wisest country
in the world--has taken a high degree at Girton, and is on
her way home again, having achieved a complete mastery over
all the elements that have tended to raise that glorious
country to her present pre-eminent position among civilized
nations!
Salata: Then in a few months Utopia may hope to be completely Angli-
cized?
Calynx: Absolutely and without a doubt.
Melene: (lazily) We are very well as we are. Life without a
care--every want supplied by a kind and fatherly monarch,
who, despot though he be, has no other thought than to make
his people happy--what have we to gain by the great change
that is in store for us?
Salata: What have we to gain? English institutions, English tastes,
and oh, English fashions!
Calynx: England has made herself what she is because, in that fa-
vored land, every one has to think for himself. Here we
have no need to think, because our monarch anticipates all
our wants, and our political opinions are formed for us by
the journals to which we subscribe. Oh, think how much more
brilliant this dialogue would have been, if we had been
accustomed to exercise our reflective powers! They say that
in England the conversation of the very meanest is a corus-
cation of impromptu epigram!
(Enter Tarara in a great rage)
Tarara: Lalabalele talala! Callabale lalabalica falahle!
Calynx: (horrified) Stop--stop, I beg! (All the ladies close their
ears.)
Tarara: Callamalala galalate! Caritalla lalabalee kallalale poo!
Ladies: Oh, stop him! stop him!
Calynx: My lord, I'm surprised at you. Are you not aware that His
Majesty, in his despotic acquiescence with the emphatic wish
of his people, has ordered that the Utopian language shall
be banished from his court, and that all communications
shall henceforward be made in the English tongue?
Tarara: Yes, I'm perfectly aware of it, although--(suddenly present-
ing an explosive "cracker"). Stop--allow me.
Calynx: (pulls it). Now, what's that for?
Tarara: Why, I've recently been appointed Public Exploder to His
Majesty, and as I'm constitutionally nervous, I must accus-
tom myself by degrees to the startling nature of my duties.
Thank you. I was about to say that although, as Public
Exploder, I am next in succession to the throne, I neverthe-
less do my best to fall in with the royal decree. But when
I am overmastered by an indignant sense of overwhelming
wrong, as I am now, I slip into my native tongue without
knowing it. I am told that in the language of that great
and pure nation, strong expressions do not exist, conse-
quently when I want to let off steam I have no alternative
but to say, "Lalabalele molola lililah kallalale poo!"
Calynx: But what is your grievance?
Tarara: This--by our Constitution we are governed by a Despot who,
although in theory absolute--is, in practice, nothing of the
kind--being watched day and night by two Wise Men whose duty
it is, on his very first lapse from political or social
propriety, to denounce him to me, the Public Exploder, and
it then becomes my duty to blow up His Majesty with
dynamite--allow me. (Presenting a cracker which Calynx
pulls.) Thank you--and, as some compensation to my wounded
feelings, I reign in his stead.
Calynx: Yes. After many unhappy experiments in the direction of an
ideal Republic, it was found that what may be described as a
Despotism tempered by Dynamite provides, on the whole, the
most satisfactory description of ruler--an autocrat who
dares not abuse his autocratic power.
Tarara: That's the theory--but in practice, how does it act? Now,
do you ever happen to see the Palace Peeper? (producing a
"Society" paper).
Calynx: Never even heard of the journal.
Tarara: I'm not surprised, because His Majesty's agents always buy
up the whole edition; but I have an aunt in the publishing
department, and she has supplied me with a copy. Well, it
actually teems with circumstantially convincing details of
the King's abominable immoralities! If this high-class
journal may be believed, His Majesty is one of the most
Heliogabalian profligates that ever disgraced an autocratic
throne! And do these Wise Men denounce him to me? Not a
bit of it! They wink at his immoralities! Under the cir-
cumstances I really think I am justified in exclaiming
"Lalabelele molola lililah kalabalale poo!" (All horri-
fied.) I don't care--the occasion demands it. (Exit Tarara)
(March. Enter Guard, escorting Scaphio and Phantis.)
CHORUS.
O make way for the Wise Men!
They are the prizemen--
Double-first in the world's university!
For though lovely this island
(Which is my land),
She has no one to match them in her city.
They're the pride of Utopia--
Cornucopia
Is each his mental fertility.
O they make no blunder,
And no wonder,
For they're triumphs of infallibility.
DUET -- Scaphio and Phantis.
In every mental lore
(The statement smacks of vanity)
We claim to rank before
The wisest of humanity.
As gifts of head and heart
We wasted on "utility,"
We're "cast" to play a part
Of great responsibility.
Our duty is to spy
Upon our King's illicites,
And keep a watchful eye
On all his eccentricities.
If ever a trick he tries
That savours of rascality,
At our decree he dies
Without the least formality.
We fear no rude rebuff,
Or newspaper publicity;
Our word is quite enough,
The rest is electricity.
A pound of dynamite
Explodes in his auriculars;
It's not a pleasant sight--
We'll spare you the particulars.
Its force all men confess,
The King needs no admonishing--
We may say its success
Is something quite astonishing.
Our despot it imbues
With virtues quite delectable,
He minds his P's and Q's,--
And keeps himself respectable.
Of a tyrant polite
He's paragon quite.
He's as modest and mild
In his ways as a child;
And no one ever met
With an autocrat yet,
So delightfully bland
To the least in the land!
So make way for the wise men, etc.
(Exeunt all but Scaphio and Phantis. Phantis is pensive.)