The song was published in 1916 by B. Feldman & Co. and republished in 1946. It has become a standard, recorded by many artists.
In Aldous Huxley's The Genius and the Goddess, there is a comment about this "'disgusting' song and how it comes again after a (war) slaughter..."[2]
The first recording, 'the original cast recording', by the first performers to sing this song, George Robey and Violet Loraine, was released on a 78rpm disc and became a hit. It was a popular recording during World War I, played in war zones as well as 'at home'.
Bernadette Peters recorded this song as “If You Were the Only Boy in the World” for her eponymous debut album, Bernadette Peters (1980), and again for the live concert recording from Carnegie Hall, Sondheim, Etc. Etc., first recorded in 1997, and later released in 2005.
In the 1971 film The Omega Man, Charlton Heston quotes the song.[15]
David Abraham sings a line of this song in the movie Kotwal Saab (1977) to celebrate the news of marriage between his two paying guests.
Jeanette Nolan plays the first line on a piano and sings "If I was the only girl in the world..." to Steve Franken in the disaster movie Avalanche (1978).
The song was heard in the 2000 episode "Pardon My Past" of the television show Charmed.
The song was sung for wounded British soldiers by the characters Lady Mary Crawley and Matthew Crawley (played by Michelle Dockery and Dan Stevens, respectively) in Series 2, Episode 4 of Downton Abbey, set in 1918 and broadcast in 2011. It was sung, ahistorically, in waltz (¾) time.
The song is played as a solo piano instrumental by the character Malcolm Hamilton in the BBC Scotland soap, River City, at the end of the 3 July 2012 episode.
Sometimes when I feel bad
and things look blue
I wish a pal I had... say one like you.
Someone within my heart to build her throne
Someone who'd never part, to call my own
If you were the only girl in the world
and I were the only boy
Nothing else would matter in the world today
We could go on loving in the same old way
Agarden of Eden just made for two
With nothing to mar our joy
I would say such wonderful things to you
There would be such wonderful things to do
If you were the only girl in the world
and I were the only boy.
No-one I'll ever care for dear... but you.
No-one I'll fancy, therefore love me do.
Your eyes have set me dreaming all night long…
Your eyes have set me scheming, right or wrong
If you were the only girl in the world
and I were the only boy
Nothing else would matter in the world today
We could go on loving in the same old way
A garden of Eden just made for two
With nothing to mar our joy
I would say such wonderful things to you
There would be such wonderful things to do
If you were the only girl in the world
and I were the only boy.[3]
