 Gilbert admired the elegant dancing part of the Harlequin and in 1879 played this character in a pantomime that he co-authored, "The Forty Thieves".Many of Gilbert's Bab Ballads, stories and other works, especially in the 1860s, reflect his interest in the harlequinade and his ideas about the moral issues that it presented, particularly in connection with the cruel character of Clown.After writing and thinking about the harlequinade for half a century, and like some of Gilbert's earlier works, "The Fairy's Dilemma" "sets pantomime fantasy alongside modern everyday life... a harlequinade parodied and subverted."