The Story of the H.M.S. Pinafore: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

The Story of the H.M.S. Pinafore, credited to W. S. Gilbert, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of The Story of the H.M.S. Pinafore, by W. S. Gilbert. Read by Noel Badrian. H.M.S. Pinafore; or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor, is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It opened in London, England, on 25 May 1878 and ran for 571 performances, which was the second-longest run of any musical theatre piece up to that time. H.M.S. Pinafore was Gilbert and Sullivan's fourth operatic collaboration and their first international sensation. This is not that opera. It was adapted as a children's book by W. S. Gilbert entitled The Story of HMS Pinafore, or The Pinafore Picture Book, and includes some lovely illustrations by Alice B. Woodward that can be seen by following the archive.org link to the actual scanned book if you wish. No singing or any of Sullivan's music, just Gilbert's witty words laid out - by him - in prose and poetry with amusing asides. (Summary by Wikipedia and ToddHW)

Recording facts

• Recording title: The Story of the H.M.S. Pinafore
• Author credits: W. S. Gilbert
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 5
• Listed recording duration: 2:01:22

Catalogue topics

• Gilbert and Sullivan
• children
• British Navy

Track guide

1. 01 - Foreword & Chapter 1 — 23:42
2. 02 - Chapter 2 — 30:34
3. 03 - Chapter 3 — 11:03
4. 04 - Chapter 4, Part 1 — 29:06
5. 05 - Chapter 4, Part 2 — 26:59

Listen to this recording

Open the complete recording and player on Internet Archive. The player includes the full track list and available download formats.

Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.