"Abdul Abulbul Amir" is the most common name for a a music-hall song written in 1877 (during the Russo-Turkish War) under the title "Abdulla Bulbul Ameer" by Percy French, and subsequently altered and popularized by a variety of other writers and performers. It tells the story of two valiant heroes – the titular Abdulla, fighting for the Turks, and his foe (originally named Ivan Potschjinsky Skidar in French's version), a Russian warrior – who encounter one another, engage in verbal boasting, and are drawn into a duel in which both perish.
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Variant Names
The names of the principal characters have been transcribed in a variety of ways in different versions of the lyrics. With respect to the title character, his last name appears as both "Ameer" and "Amir", and the syllable break between his first and middle names varies from version to version (originally "Abdulla Bulbul", as seen below, but often rendered as "Abdul Abulbul").
His Russian opponent's name has been more drastically modified over time. First given as "Ivan Potschjinksi Skidar", the character is perhaps best known today as "Ivan Skavinsky Skivar", with considerable variation in the spelling of both the middle and last names.
Lyrics
A great many versions of the lyrics exist, with the names of the principal characters spelled in a variety of ways. The following, presented by biographer James N. Healy, appears to be the most authoritative available text. According to Healy, French sold his rights in the song for five pounds while failing to register his copyright to it, and subsequently discovered that a London publisher had produced an altered and unauthorized version which failed to identify French as the author.
Abdullah Bul Bul Ameer
Various versions varied to a greater or lesser degree from French's original. For instance, the lyric in the 1896 New Harvard Songbook makes several changes including the names of the principals:
Parody Version
An explicit parody of the song, with some variation in the lyrics, is traditionally sung by some British Rugby football clubs.
Cartoon
The song was adapted in 1941 into an MGM cartoon, Abdul the Bulbul-Ameer, with Fred Quimby producing and direction by Hugh Harman. Voice acting for the nine-minute cartoon was provided by Cliff Nazarro, Harry Stanton, Leon Belasco and Hans Conried, while Frank Crumit wrote new lyrics. It features caricatures of Groucho Marx, Lou Costello and Al Ritz as news reporters. In this version, Abdul is depicted as a bully who picks on Ivan's dwarf friend, provoking Ivan into treading on the Turk's toe. He has many traits of 1930s and 1940s cartoon villains, such as Bluto, including thick lips, a beard and a big belly. There is a brief swordfight, which soon changes into a brawl, that ends with Ivan and Abdul literally "out cold", after falling through a frozen lake and emerging frozen in a pillar of ice thanks to Ivan's friend who planted a bomb on Abdul and it is unknown if they are being thawed or not. The more positive portrayal of the Russians could have been due to the newly formed alliance between Britain and the USSR following Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union in the year of the cartoon's production and release.
Commercial
In the 1980s Whitbread adapted the song using their own lyrics for a series of commercials on British television, suggesting that the two protagonists were great fans of their beer who squabbled over trivialities, because they had forgotten that "the best best needs no etiquette". The commercials starred Stephen Fry as Ivan, Tony Cosmo as Abdul, Tim McInnerny and Roy Castle, and were directed by Paul Weiland.
A variant of the poem appeared in an ad for Springmaid cotton sheets in Life magazine, 7 January 1952.
In popular culture
In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Brothers", the character Lore is heard singing verses of the song as he murders Noonien Soong, commenting "I've always loved that old ditty".
Author Steven Millhauser, winner of the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, used a variation of the song in his first novel Edwin Mullhouse: The Life and Death of an American Writer 1943–1954 By Jeffrey Cartwright.
In the 1935 film Shipmates Forever Dick Powell's Crooner turned Midshipman character, Dick Melville is ordered by upper-classmen to sing just the first 100 verses of "Abdul...". Upon leaving the room, another upper-classman asks for help with verse 38.
In the 1949 film Task Force, Gary Cooper's naval aviation officer character "Jonathan Scott" sings a line from "Abdul..," telling Jane Wyatt's character "Mary Morgan" that all the Annapolis cadets in his day had to learn the song.
In Beau Sabreur, the 1926 sequel to Beau Geste, the novelist has a femme fatale whistle a tune (which the narrator identified as 'that popular aire') then she sings a verse to tease the French officer she calls 'Major Ivan.' She uses the words 'Ivan Potschjinski Skivah.'
A parody of the song, in which Abdul and Ivan engage in a competition for which can have sex with more prostitutes in a given time, is sung at rugby clubs, and appeared on the album Wicked Rugby Songs by The Shower-Room Squad.
In Martin Gardner's book The Magic Numbers of Dr. Matrix, the final article places Irving Joshua Matrix in Istanbul, using the alias of Abdul Abulbul Amir. He is later reported to have duelled with a KGB agent Ivan Skavinsky Skavar, with both of them perishing as a result. Seven years later, it turned out Dr. Matrix has faked his death to avoid retaliation by KGB.