Time & Perspective Quote by Allan Sherman

Self-pity gets a makeover here, dressed in the crisp suit of a punchline. Allan Sherman doesn’t claim his family has suffered more than anyone else; he claims they’ve suffered so consistently they deserve editorial billing. The joke lands because it borrows the language of greatness - “the great history,” “stand extremely high,” “table of contents” - and uses it to dignify something undignified: the relentless, petty accumulation of mishaps that make a household feel cosmically singled out.

As a musician-comedian who turned mid-century Jewish domestic anxiety into pop entertainment, Sherman is operating in a tradition where complaint isn’t weakness, it’s craft. The line’s rhythm mimics bragging, but the content is grievance; that tension is the engine. He’s also quietly parodying the American obsession with legacy. Most families dream of being remembered for achievement; Sherman’s family will be remembered for trouble, filed neatly like a bestseller. It’s a sly indictment of the need to narrativize pain into something orderly, even prestigious.

The “table of contents” detail is key: it reduces suffering to a bureaucratic convenience, a catalog you can flip through. That’s funny because it’s true to how people cope - by organizing chaos into stories, then competing over whose story is worst. Sherman turns that competition into communal relief. If the universe insists on handing you calamity, at least you can demand top placement in the book.