Hello sailor

by Eric Idle

First edition hardcover in very good condition, with unclipped dust jacket in acceptable condition. Jacket is scuffed, and edges are creased and torn. Board corners and spine ends are bumped. Spine is slightly cocked. Boards are clean, binding is sound and pages are clear. LW

Genres: Humor, Satire

184 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Eric Idle is an English comedian, actor, author and composer of comedic songs. He wrote and performed as a member of the internationally renowned British comedy group Monty Python.

Reviews

[Bas · Rating 4 out of 5]

One thing this book offers is an indisputably beautiful cover that will make your friends' eyes pop if they see it and don't know who Eric Idle is. Then again the less friends you have who don't know Eric Idle the better.

While it's pretty close to the spirit of the book, most of the actual content has nothing to do with effeminately made up sea-men. Instead Hello Sailor offers some heavy satire on British politics. A bit of satire on American politics is thrown in as well for good measure.

It follows the antics of a couple of interesting characters through the course of a few days. There's the prime minister who's infatuated with a little, blonde, beau boy called Bobo, while being terrified of her royal highness. There's also the secretary for foreign affairs who's very important in the story, even though he doesn't say a single word throughout it. That's not his fault though. It's mostly because he's dead. Then there's Jonathan who has a naughty record to break. If that isn't enough yet, we also get a highly frustrated astronaut, a highly confused royal air force, an American president who thinks highly of phoning from the comfort of the bathroom and a full-time groupie who is occasionally high.

I would like to issue a complaint (which has nothing to do with parrots) about this book though. It has too much sex in it. While I do love sex (a sentiment shared to a very high extent by every single character in Hello Sailor), the large amount of lewd humor we are presented with here pretty much exhausts the book's capacity for jokes. There just isn't a lot of room for other kinds of humor. I especially missed jokes on awkward language usage, which Idle focused on in his Monty Python sketches when they weren't mostly smutty.

That said it's still very funny and has some pretty memorable parts and characters in it. It is also a lot better than Eric Idle's better known work The Road To Mars, which isn't horrible, but just isn't all that good either (rather read the Hitchhikers Guide and Red Dwarf books if you want humorist sci-fi).

[Mark Speed · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not Eric Idle's finest hour.

If you remember the character Idle plays in And Now For Something Completely Different who keeps nudging an older man and pestering about 'candid photography' and 'holiday snaps' of his wife, and saying "nudge-nudge, wink-wink, eh-eh?" The novel is rather like being on the receiving end of that over-energetic character's conversation. It grates after a while and the lewdness is spelled out a bit too heavily.

I found the characters a bit two-dimensional and the whole thing unabsorbing. But then it's not trying to be serious satire. Or maybe it's a piss-take of serious satire? A quick read, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it if you're a die-hard Python fan.

[David]

It's outrageous that this scholarly work by Dr Tom Jack should be circulated as though it were in any way connected with one of those "Monty Python" degenerates. Reminds me of the kerfluffle over The Golden Skits of Wing-Commander Muriel Volestrangler, FRHS & BAR. This book is not about the Navy or the Merchant Marine. Nor it it (intercourse) at all (coitus) about the human tendency to (fellatio) devote disparate quantities (see what I did there?) of time to sex. Dr Jack, a cunning linguist, has produced a deeply penetrating expose of incompetence in politics, government, and brothel-keeping, not necessarily in that order (or position). It is a disgrace that Mr Rice Lied has claimed authorship of this screwing look at the current state of Britain's ruler class.

[Erin]

This book is definitely a product of its time. All females (save the Queen) exist primarily as sex objects.

It’s a sort of fun and silly satire of government, and fans of the carry-on wobbly tits school of British comedy probably won’t be too disappointed. Anyone else may want to give Hello Sailor a wide berth.

[Art the Turtle of Amazing Girth · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.11/5

I pushed through this today to get past it

Dumbest book I've ever read, and easily in my bottom 5 all time

It is obviously, so far, my lowest rated book in 2025

[Yang G · Rating 3 out of 5]

A slim volume so a quick read. Can't say I understood everything (logic, jokes, the point of this book) but I think that's part of the appeal. I guess it's supposed to be silly. I did laugh quite a bit throughout though.

[Lysergius · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book by a Python is always an event!

[Stevyn Colgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh. Some great gags. A lot of bad ones. Read like an extended version of Idle's 'Nudge nudge wink wink say no more' sketch. Expected more TBH.

[Steve Mitchell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written in 1975 and very much reflecting the attitude of the time, this book is the kind of anarchic farce that you would expect from a member of the Monty Python team. Unfortunately the standard is very much on a par with the final series: the one the BBC doesn’t repeat.