A limited company is equivalent to an American corporation in that the shareholders cannot lose more than their investments if the enterprise becomes bankrupt. (The word “limited” implies limited liability.) What particularly galled Gilbert was that the entrepreneurs who form a limited company are thus overly protected, being required to pay debts only to the extent of their declared capital (as brought out by Mr. Goldbury near the end of the first act). Gilbert’s venom may have been inspired by the Gurneys, a wealthy family mentioned in Trial by Jury. In 1865, after several generations of Gurneys had grown rich in the banking business, they formed themselves into a limited-liability company, and then went into bankruptcy the following year, leaving unpaid debts of eleven million pounds sterling––something like sixty million dollars. The Gurneys themselves lost hardly a shilling. Wolfson (322) has a more intriguing target: Richard D’Oyly Carte, himself. At the time Gilbert was writing Utopia Limited, Carte was busily engaged in some maneuvers to sell shares in his money-guzzling Royal English Opera House. Although Gilbert and Carte had returned to some semblance of civilized relationship following the famous carpet quarrel, Gilbert still had an ax to grind––or at least that is Wolfson’s thesis. A remarkable sidelight to all this occurred during the D’Oyly Carte revival of the opera in 1975. Michael Rayner, playing the role of Mr. Goldbury (the exponent of limited liability) came on stage made up and dressed to look like the Vanity Fair cartoon of D’Oyly Carte, complete with cigar, cane, and roll of blueprints under his arm.
