Talk:Lydia the Tattooed Lady

Untitled[edit]

Since Najinsky was male, should the lyric not be 'Here's his social security numba'? Or is it a joke about ballet dancers being effeminite? Brequinda 09:29, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Hold on a minute. I take it back - it would be her number - Lydia's number! Forget I mentioned it... Brequinda 09:30, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I think it was a joking (slang?) reference to her bust, hip, and waist measurements, as in 36-24-36. That is, a number that secures her social life, vaguely similar in form to the then-relatively new Social Security number. --♥ «Charles A. L.» 23:54, 7 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

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Ahem. Copyrighted lyric. Does nobody have a problem with that? Lee M 02:22, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Was it Klinger who sang the song in the M*A*S*H TV episode? I recall it was Hawkeye.

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Is "Mendel" really a reference to Gregor Mendel, the geneticist monk? Currently, the word "Mendel" links to the monk's page...Nitwitpicker (talk) 02:39, 7 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There shouldn't be a comma between Mendel and Picasso. The link to Gregor Mendel is ridiculous. The obvious joke in the lyric is that the Picasso referred to isn't Pablo Picasso, but a low-rent artist named Mendel Picasso, who is Jewish. Get it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 160.93.72.146 (talk) 15:07, 12 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I deleted Picasso from the list of Lydia's tattoos. He's not on her body; he just drew her tat of Buffalo Bill.Just1thing (talk) 18:03, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright[edit]

Someone seems to think that the song is out of copyright. I don't think so; sheet music I've seen says "copyright 1939 (renewed 1967) Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer Inc. c/o EMI Feist Catalog, Inc." --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 05:01, 27 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. Both the movie and the song are still protected by copyright. Yworo (talk) 18:11, 27 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The lyrics are copyrighted. Their inclusion here on Wikipedia is a copyright voiolation, and a Wikipedia violation. Deleted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.7.62.214 (talk) 02:30, 24 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Intro[edit]

At the beginning of the song Lydia is compared to Guiess, DuBarry, and Garbo. Garbo refers to the actress Greta Garbo. DuBarry refers to Jeanne Bécu, comtesse du Barry. Who was Guiess?

According to http://minniesboys.blogspot.com/2009/03/lydia-tattooed-lady-revealed.html the line is a bad transcription that should have read "Thaïs, du Barry, Garbo". I'll make the change and see if it and see if it flies. Mohanchous (talk) 12:42, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"Najinsky" is spelled Nijinsky, I fixed that, too. Lg king (talk) 21:38, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thaïs refers the Alexander the Greek's "traveling prostitute". These women were more than just prostitutes, they were usually highly educated and not only provided sexual favor, but were intelligent enough to be a sounding board and provide pertinent conversation.

remove first part of lyrics[edit]

I suggest removing the first two parts from the "Lyrics" section - i.e., "My life was wrapped around the circus" and "She was the most glorious creature." As far as I know, these are not part of the official lyrics, and only appeared in "At The Circus". The sheet music I have certainly doesn't include them. Thoughts, anyone? I'll check back in a few weeks. Elsquared (talk) 03:15, 23 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

“My life was wrapped around the circus” is dialogue from the movie, but “She was the most glorious creature” is a vestigial verse, such as most pop songs of the pre-rock era have; it’s in sheet music. John W. Kennedy (talk) 20:22, 30 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Betty Broadbent[edit]

I think BoringHistoryGuy may be on to something with this edit, but it's too tenuous a connection and looks to me like original research. This source indicates that Broadbent was not unique, nor was she the first tattooed lady. In At the Circus, Marx's introductory line is "I met her at the World's Fair in 1900," so I'd guess the act had strong associations with the older Vaudeville scene. To meet the threshhold of verifiability to claim Broadbent as the primary inspiration for the song, we'd need to find a source documenting Marx (or someone close to him) explicitly discussing Broadbent in relation to the song. Ibadibam (talk) 20:03, 6 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ibadibam. Why is your focus on Groucho Marx? It was Yip Harburg who wrote the lyrics, which contain multiple references to the 1939 World's Fair. Betty Broadbent was a sensation at the fair (as was Gypsy Rose Lee), and her tattoos depicted historical figures such as Charles Lindbergh and Pancho Villa. I think "may have been inspired by" was a reasonable enough way to convey that the connection is not definite, but more than possible. == BoringHistoryGuy (talk) 19:35, 10 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, thanks for the correction about authorship. So what we need, then, is a source accounting for Harburg's inspiration. In the absence of that, I think the best we can do is a short paragraph on the history of tattooed ladies, with a final sentence to the effect of, "A notable performer in 1939 was Betty Broadbent, who appeared at the World's Fair." Does that seem like a reasonable way to include this information, without crossing into conjecture? Ibadibam (talk) 17:24, 11 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'm afraid I have to throw cold water on this. This article has no business tracing the history of tattooed ladies -- just link to Tattooed lady for that. And randomly referring to Betty Broadbent, out of the blue, violates WP:SYNTH by implying to the reader she's somehow related to the song when we have no source indicating that. Sorry. E Eng 05:27, 18 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

To my credit, at the time of this discussion, the Tattooed lady article didn't exist yet. Now that it does, I agree that there's no reason to bring it up in the article about the song. Ibadibam (talk) 18:19, 18 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Pigalle[edit]

Note that Django Reinhardt's Pigalle is identical to the first of the two major themes in Lydia. Check it ou on Youtube. I've been unable to determine which of the two pieces came first. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.23.122.97 (talk) 05:22, 17 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The first phrase of each composition starts on the same note, has a similar contour, and ends in a half cadence, but I'd say the similarity ends there. On the one hand we have "Pigalle", recorded in 1949...