# he reads to us from something called 'Ulysses'. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 9, 2014, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891 "2014-10-09T20:15:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 19
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/361 "2014-10-31T19:50:08Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > Except on the album I cited when I brought it up in the first place. > > [http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qPyg2PWfKds/Tq3UcvEB1CI/AAAAAAAAQkM/IAhND7wSP-4/s1600/Allan+Sherman+-+My+Name+Is+Allan+back.jpg](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qPyg2PWfKds/Tq3UcvEB1CI/AAAAAAAAQkM/IAhND7wSP-4/s1600/Allan+Sherman+-+My+Name+Is+Allan+back.jpg) Thanks for the information, but this album was released nearly 2 1/2 years after _My Son, the Nut_, the album that contained “Hello Muddah! Hello Fadduh!” (with two other albums released in between them). That seems kind of a long gestation period for a joke. Maybe the singing group itself changed its name at the time? I know that if I were managing a singing group that I wanted to be consistently known in the industry for its work, I wouldn’t take kindly to the request that a comedian could arbitrarily change the name of my group on an album’s credit just so said comedian could make an obscure in-joke. Would you? ---
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/362 "2014-10-31T19:54:55Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I have not read 50 Shades of Gray. I will never read 50 Shades of Gray. But if someone made a joke about it, I’d sure as hell know what he was talking about. You’re seriously considering the renown a mass market book is able to achieve in the digital age with the kind of renown that was possible for a highbrow piece of literature to achieve nationwide with the media available in 1963? ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/363 "2014-10-31T19:55:21Z")
> [@DChord568](#): > > Maybe the singing group itself changed its name at the time? I know that if I were managing a singing group that I wanted to be consistently known in the industry for its work, I wouldn’t take kindly to the request that a comedian could arbitrarily change the name of my group on an album’s credit just so said comedian could make an obscure in-joke. Would you? Well, can you find even one other instance of the group being credited that way? I couldn’t. ---
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/364 "2014-10-31T19:59:55Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > Well, can you find even one other instance of the group being credited that way? I couldn’t. No, not on an album, but I did find an obituary for one of the group’s members in which the group was credited that way. As obituaries are routinely created by a family member, it would seem that that name must have had some currency with in the group. I honestly believe the scenario of creating an in-joke 2 1/2 years after the fact is more improbable than a simpler explanation. ---
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/365 "2014-10-31T20:14:24Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Absolutely right. Obviously, nothing that the country’s premiere newspaper, the one every other media outlet looked to for guidance, wrote about could possibly be reflective of what the country might be talking about. And equally obviously, New Yorker Allan Sherman himself would never deign to read the Times for what was current and trendy in order to use in a song aimed at other New Yorkers who might be reading the very same papers he read. Why, it would be silly to assume that the timing you yourself asked about might be a factor when the book had just been all over the country’s papers for two years, a uniquely important period in the book’s lifetime. And downright pernicious to leave off Homer and his work not-called Ulysses even though it had all of four mentions in the Times in that same period, or 5% as many. Why should reality and context count for anything at all when you can provide your own imaginary facts and alternate world? I’m afraid I’m going to have to repeat a phrase I used in an earlier post: you really need to get out more. Remembering again that the phrase I used was “top of mind,” which implies top of mind for the entire population, not just a selected portion of it — if you honestly think that everything you state above had an impact on a greater rather than a smaller percentage of sentient adults in the United States in this era, then you know little about the composition of the U.S. population in 1963. And if you think the ONLY standard for nationwide renown of ANY cultural phenomenon (be it Joyce or Homer) at a given moment is the number of times it’s mentioned in _The New York Times_ — well, then see the above paragraph. ("_The Times_ only mentioned Homer four times in 1963; therefore, no one in 1963 knew anything about Homer. Seriously?) I’m afraid it’s you whose making up an “alternate world” and imagining that your little insular one is reflective of the world as a whole. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/366 "2014-10-31T20:17:58Z")
**DChord** , do you believe that this line is funnier as a reference to Homer than as a reference to Joyce? No qualifications about what kids or DJs might think, but to adults who were already fans of Allan Sherman when the album was released. Do you think that the reference to Joyce did not occur to Allan Sherman? Please clarify on those matters. What DJs and kids might think, what other interpretations of the line you and others may have are not really relevant. Those are the two key questions here. I don’t find any reason to insult you over this matter, I hope I haven’t been doing so. You don’t have to let the attitude of others take you in that direction. This is turning into a classic thread and it’s better highlighted by humor than brickbats. ---
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/367 "2014-10-31T20:23:26Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > And you’re still treating the song as if it were actually written by a child, and not by an adult satirist. I repeat: even if it is plausible that a \*kid \*might somehow misconstrue the title of the reading, it makes absolutely no sense for \*Sherman \*to refer to one work of literature by the title of another and expect his audience to realize that he was doing so. Why is this so, if Sherman is singing the entire song in the voice of that child? If every other thing reported in the song is told through the eyes of that child, why would the “voice” suddenly change for one line? In my view of the song, Sherman is recounting exactly what an 8-year-old child would report if he were being read to from a book whose words contained repeated mentions of the word “Ulysses” — just as he’s recounting what that child would say if older campers told him fearsome (though obviously false) tales of alligators in the lake or bears in the forest. And in my view, Sherman “expected” the majority of the audience to hear “Ulysses” and think “brave, heroic warrior”— rather than “dirty book by James Joyce.” And even if this is not what Sherman intended, I continue to assert that this is exactly what the majority of the audience (including radio programmers) did. ---
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/368 "2014-10-31T20:56:32Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > **DChord** , do you believe that this line is funnier as a reference to Homer than as a reference to Joyce? No qualifications about what kids or DJs might think, but to adults who were already fans of Allan Sherman when the album was released. Do you think that the reference to Joyce did not occur to Allan Sherman?. Do I personally believe it’s funnier with Homer? Yes, I do. I said a long time ago that I could picture a dumb as a rock coach “demming” and “doseing” his way through a reading of Homer, and that I find this more amusing than a coach reading a dirty book to a group of pre-sexual kids. I think I also mentioned that there was just such a coach at my high school who taught “Health” class. Once I had this wonderful experience, I put that coach in the role of the coach in Sherman’s song in every subsequent hearing of it. Certainly, it’s plausible that “adults who already fans” of Sherman heard the line as a reference to Joyce. My small sample confirmed that some hear it this way regardless of whether they were fans before or not — but that this group was in the minority. And it’s also plausible that the reference to Joyce occurred to Sherman. However, stay tuned for something rather important that speaks to this. > [@](#): > > Please clarify on those matters. What DJs and kids might think, what other interpretations of the line you and others may have are not really relevant. Those are the two key questions here. My contention is that these issues are relevant if we want to take a “big-picture” look at the phenomenon of “Hello Muddah! Hello Fadduh!” > [@](#): > > I don’t find any reason to insult you over this matter, I hope I haven’t been doing so. You don’t have to let the attitude of others take you in that direction. This is turning into a classic thread and it’s better highlighted by humor than brickbats. I appreciate this, and I’m sure that I have been “taken in that direction” at times, though I’ve tried not to be. I would again point out that one’s perception of “insults” is much more forgiving when those insults are hurled at someone with whom you disagree. ---
**Author:** ![DChord568](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@DChord568](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DChord568)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/369 "2014-10-31T21:08:58Z")
Through the magic of inter-library loan, last night I acquired a copy of _Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman_ by Mark Cohen (Brandeis University Press, Copyright 2013, Mark Cohen). Let us stipulate that Mark Cohen knows more about Allan Sherman than any living person. This is a throughly researched biography with 39 pages of referenced footnotes and a 15-page Bibliography. From the skimming of it I did last night, it is apparent that Allan Sherman was a brilliant but very troubled man, with some serious issues with his childhood and his relationship with his parents. Alas, the book contains no passage that reveals “This is what Alan Sherman said he had in mind when he wrote the ‘Ulysses’ line of ‘Hello Muddah! Hello Fadduh!’” However, it does contain the following passage on Page 54, which I will reproduce verbatim (while highlighting two words from it that I think are quite relevant to our discussion): > [@](#): > > [A friend] helped Sherman land a summer job at Camp Ojibwa, a sports camp in Eagle River, Wisconsin, popular since 1918 with Jewish boys from the Chicago area. Sherman was in charge of the camp’s entertainment program, and he had problems meeting deadlines even then. “Don’t come back until you’ve written a show,” is what the camp director told Sherman as he set him adrift in a canoe, remembered one former camper. Ojibwa was an odd fit for the overweight Sherman. Its **manly** spirit is exemplified by its yearbook, called _ **The Warrior** _, and that culture made a lasting impression he naturally turned into comedy. In “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh” he sings, “And the head coach, wants no sissies / So he reads to us from something called Ulysses.” I’ll be interested in a reaction to this passage from some of the posters to this thread. ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/370 "2014-10-31T21:15:45Z")
Right. The coach reading something to make them more manly he got from his youth. Coaches always want to de-sissified boys. He turns _into_ comedy by taking it to the absurd. A normal coach might read Boy’s Life, or Last of the Mohicans. That would be normal. The fact it was Joyce’s Ulysses (like an inappropriate gym teacher showing the kids Playboy to make them ‘men’) makes it absurd and funny. That’s what we’ve been saying all along. He took an event from his youth and made it art. ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/371 "2014-10-31T21:21:34Z")
FWIW, I linked to a literary analysis of Ulysses by Cambridge University that clearly discussed the book as being referenced in this song, if we’re swapping literary references. You must have missed that post, since you didn’t comment on it. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/372 "2014-10-31T21:24:06Z")
> [@DChord568](#): > > Do I personally believe it’s funnier with Homer? Yes, I do. Ok, you and I will just have to agree not to agree about this until you agree that you are wrong. However, you didn’t answer the other question, do you think that the reference to Joyce did not occur to Allan Sherman? ---
**Author:** ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/373 "2014-10-31T21:32:10Z")
> [@DChord568](#): > > Through the magic of inter-library loan, last night I acquired a copy of _Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman_ by Mark Cohen (Brandeis University Press, Copyright 2013, Mark Cohen). > > Let us stipulate that Mark Cohen knows more about Allan Sherman than any living person. This is a throughly researched biography with 39 pages of referenced footnotes and a 15-page Bibliography. > > From the skimming of it I did last night, it is apparent that Allan Sherman was a brilliant but very troubled man, with some serious issues with his childhood and his relationship with his parents. > > Alas, the book contains no passage that reveals “This is what Alan Sherman said he had in mind when he wrote the ‘Ulysses’ line of ‘Hello Muddah! Hello Fadduh!’” > > However, it does contain the following passage on Page 54, which I will reproduce verbatim (while highlighting two words from it that I think are quite relevant to our discussion): > > I’ll be interested in a reaction to this passage from some of the posters to this thread. My reaction is mostly “Dude. Turn off the computer and go for a walk or something”. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/374 "2014-10-31T21:32:53Z")
Ok guys, there must be some way to settle this issue with some kind of paper towel tube test if 100 $ bets don’t work. But maybe the paper towel tube hadn’t been invented yet in 1963, just like sexual allusions in pop songs and lying to your parents. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/375 "2014-10-31T21:42:34Z")
> [@DChord568](#): > > I’m afraid I’m going to have to repeat a phrase I used in an earlier post: you really need to get out more. Oh, Ouroborous! Oh, Ulysses! Oh, humanity! ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/376 "2014-10-31T21:47:49Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > Oh, Ouroborous! Oh, Ulysses! Oh, humanity! O Discordia! > **[Discordia](https://darktower.fandom.com/wiki/Discordia)** > > For the Online Game see: Discordia (Game) Discordia is the state of chaos and anarchy that would be caused by the collapse of the Dark Tower. It is the Crimson King's goal to bring about this state. The Crimson King believed that not only would he... ---
**Author:** ![Strainger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/strainger/32/244_2.png) [@Strainger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strainger)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/377 "2014-10-31T21:49:10Z")
> [@IvoryTowerDenizen](#): > > FWIW, I linked to a literary analysis of Ulysses by Cambridge University that clearly discussed the book as being referenced in this song, if we’re swapping literary references. You must have missed that post, since you didn’t comment on it. You couldn’t be referring to [this](http://books.google.com/books?id=mINxBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA33&lpg=PA33&dq=ulysses+cambridge+camp&source=bl&ots=h-LeO6AhN8&sig=UC-2D4KISpsjPl5-nm0wpCQq8Is&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3wBUVOj_KsXqoASF_4CgCg&ved=0CCQQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=ulysses%20cambridge%20camp&f=false), could you? In which the author writes the following? > [@](#): > > Unexpected allusions to the book proliferate as well, such as the epigram above [referring to the stanza of Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah currently being discussed], lyrics from a popular novelty song in which a neurotically masculinized camp counselor reads \*Ulysses \*to baffled children. Surely you can’t be citing them. Those Cambridge University idiots obviously don’t know what they’re talking about. ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/378 "2014-10-31T21:55:53Z")
> [@Strainger](#): > > You couldn’t be referring to [this](http://books.google.com/books?id=mINxBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA33&lpg=PA33&dq=ulysses+cambridge+camp&source=bl&ots=h-LeO6AhN8&sig=UC-2D4KISpsjPl5-nm0wpCQq8Is&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3wBUVOj_KsXqoASF_4CgCg&ved=0CCQQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=ulysses%20cambridge%20camp&f=false), could you? In which the author writes the following?Surely you can’t be citing them. Those Cambridge University idiots obviously don’t know what they’re talking about. That’s right, and I would never have mentioned it in post [237](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17836105&postcount=237) ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/379 "2014-10-31T22:25:45Z")
> [@DChord568](#): > > I’ll be interested in a reaction to this passage from some of the posters to this thread. My reaction: He didn’t get the joke. ---
**Author:** ![erysichthon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d07c76/32.png) [@erysichthon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erysichthon)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891/380 "2014-10-31T22:31:51Z")
> [@DChord568](#): > > I’ve dealt with this several times, most recently in the second portion of [this post](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17842612&postcount=284). Answer the question it poses honestly, and then we can talk again. You “dealt with this” by concocting this wholly imaginary scene: > [@](#): > > The head coach is in the front of the room in front of a fairly large gathering of campers. He has a book in his hand. Like many books of its day, it has a plain cover with no illustration on it, no title in big bold letters. He begins reading from the book without announcing its title. (Or if for some reason he does announce it, he says it only once.) So, in order to accept your explanation of why Sherman calls the book _Ulysses_ when he really meant _The Odyssey_, we also have to buy into your hyper-realistic interpretation of the song? Nope, not happening. I’ll go with the simpler, Occam’s Razor explanation that when Sherman wrote “something called _Ulysses_,” he meant something called _Ulysses_. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891.md?page=18) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/he-reads-to-us-from-something-called-ulysses/700891.md?page=20)