Henry Brougham Farnie

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Farnie and his golfer's manual

1898 Tasmanian production

Henry Brougham Farnie (8 April 1836 – 21 September 1889), often called H. B. Farnie, was a British librettist and adapter of French operettas and an author. Some of his English-language versions of operettas became record-setting hits on the London stage of the 1870s and 1880s, strongly competing with the Gilbert and Sullivan operas being played at the same time.

1 Life and career
2 Notes
3 External links

[edit] Life and career

Farnie was born in Burntisland, Fife, Scotland, one of seven children of James Farnie and the former Margaret Paterson Cairns.^[1] He was educated at St. Andrews and Cambridge.

[edit] Author

In 1857, Farnie wrote the first book on golf instruction, The Golfer's Manual: being an historical and descriptive account of the national game of Scotland, under the pseudonym, "A Keen Hand". He also wrote the Handy book of St. Andrews about the flora of that area of Scotland, and The City of St. Rule with calotypes by Thomas Rodger (1860).

[edit] Librettist and adapter of French operettas

Farnie wrote or adapted libretti for dozens of operettas. Some of his adaptations include the English libretti for Jacques Offenbach's Breaking the Spell (Le Violoneau) (1870; later played as a companion piece with The Sorcerer),^[2] Barbe-bleue (1872, Bluebeard), Geneviève de Brabant (1873), Dick Whittington and his Cat (1875), The Rose of Auvergne, or, Spoiling the Broth, The Barber of Bath, La Fille du Tambour-Major, the very successful Madame Favart (1879), and The Blind Beggars (1882); for Robert Planquette's hit debut, Les cloches de Corneville (1878), Rip van Winkle (1882), Nell Gwynne (1884), Les voltigeurs de la 32ème (The Light Infantrymen of the 32nd Regiment) (1887), and Paul Jones (1889); for Edmond Audran's Olivette (1880; another hit) and La mascotte (1881); for Charles Lecocq's La fille de Madame Angot (1873); for Richard Genée's The Naval Cadets (1880); for Franz von Suppé's Boccaccio (1882); for Francois Chassaigne's Falka (1883); and for Hervé's Little Faust! (1870)^[3] and Chilpéric (1884). With Genee, in 1880 at the Globe, he wrote The Naval Cadets. With Englishman Edward Solomon, Farnie wrote Rothomago or The Magic Watch in 1879. With William Marshall Hutchison, he wrote Glamour in 1886.

Some of Farnie's most enduring songs are the "Gendarmes' Duet" (adapted from Offenbach's Geneviève de Brabant), "Sweet Dreamer" (with Arthur Sullivan),^[4] and "Time's Up" (with Rosenbloom).

The following Farnie shows were performed on Broadway as well as in London: Sinbad the Sailor (1869), Pluto (1869), The Forty Thieves (1870), Little Faust (1870, revived 1871), Bluebeard (1872), Nemesis Not Wisely But Too Well (1874),^[5] Indiana (1887),^[6] and Nell Gwynne (1901).

Farnie wrote some original libretti, including Nemesis (see image at right). He also collaborated with Robert Reece on 15 of his libretti or adaptations, including Up the River, or the Strict Kew-Tea (1877)^[7] Stars and Garters (1878), Les cloches de Corneville (1878) and The Creole, all at the Folly Theatre, London (where Farnie also acted as stage manager), and Boccaccio.^[8]

[edit] Marriages and notable legal action

Farnie married Elizabeth Bebb Davies, of Wales, in 1861, but the couple lived in Scotland. She divorced him for adultery after a few years, and he then married Alethea Emma Harvey, an Englishwoman, in 1865. In 1879, his second wife, also complaining of adultery and cruelty, petitioned the English courts for a declaration that her own marriage with the defendant was null and void. The case made legal history: Harvey's argument was that since the first marriage was solemnised in England, the courts in Scotland did not have the power to end that marriage by divorce, and therefore, Farnie had not been free to marry Harvey. The Lords found that the divorce decree of the Scottish courts should be respected by the English courts.^[1]

Farnie died at the age of 53 in Paris, France.^[9]