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Three Men #1
Three Men in a Boat
This a previously-published edition of ISBN 9780140621334
"We agree that we are overworked, and need a rest - A week on the rolling deep? - George suggests the river -"
And with the co-operation of several hampers of food and a covered boat, the three men (not forgetting the dog) set out on a hilarious voyage of mishaps up the Thames. When not falling in the river and getting lost in Hampton Court Maze, Jerome K. Jerome finds time to express his ideas on the world around - many of which have acquired a deeper fascination since the day at the end of the 19th century when this excursion was so lightly undertaken.
"We agree that we are overworked, and need a rest - A week on the rolling deep? - George suggests the river -"
And with the co-operation of several hampers of food and a covered boat, the three men (not forgetting the dog) set out on a hilarious voyage of mishaps up the Thames. When not falling in the river and getting lost in Hampton Court Maze, Jerome K. Jerome finds time to express his ideas on the world around - many of which have acquired a deeper fascination since the day at the end of the 19th century when this excursion was so lightly undertaken.
185 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1889
About the author
Jerome K. Jerome
1,055 books1,094 followersEnglish author Jerome Klapka Jerome, best known for the humorous travelogue
Three Men in a Boat
.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerome_K...
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerome_K...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 6,383 reviews
October 1, 2018
Timeless.
Bonus points for having a dog.
Bonus points for having a dog.
May 6, 2015
This book is a strange mix. Part of it is of a particular kind of obvious humour. Sort of like watching a very pompous-looking person talking loudly into their cell-phone and paying no attention to where they are going and therefore fails to notice the banana skin everyone else has been avoiding. Bamm, down she goes, and hahaha, its just so funny, you have to laugh. There are also amusing incidents with the fox terrier Montmorency, whose chief pleasures in life seem to be fighting and hanging out with packs of street dogs. One gets the impression that JKJ wouldn't at all mind being reincarnated as an immoral, street-fighting, anarchic dog in the care of very liberal and approving owners.
The book is full of side-stories, none of them particularly interesting and some of them absolutely dire. Near the end was a highly-romanticised account of a woman with an illegitimate baby committing suicide by drowning. How the waters lovingly embraced her and gave her peace. That's what's wrong with this book. Highly amusing incidents intermixed with purple prose, a travelogue of some of England's most boring towns, and whatever struck the author as (I want to say interesting, but I don't believe it really) something that would fill in the narrative and be 'educational'. A good editor could cut this to a really wonderful funny book only about a third-long. In this case the abridged version would be a hell of a lot better than the original and I would have given it more than 3-stars.
So humour - 5 stars
Travelogue and lyrical pieces - 1 star
Montmorency - 3 stars
Av. 3 stars.
The book is full of side-stories, none of them particularly interesting and some of them absolutely dire. Near the end was a highly-romanticised account of a woman with an illegitimate baby committing suicide by drowning. How the waters lovingly embraced her and gave her peace. That's what's wrong with this book. Highly amusing incidents intermixed with purple prose, a travelogue of some of England's most boring towns, and whatever struck the author as (I want to say interesting, but I don't believe it really) something that would fill in the narrative and be 'educational'. A good editor could cut this to a really wonderful funny book only about a third-long. In this case the abridged version would be a hell of a lot better than the original and I would have given it more than 3-stars.
So humour - 5 stars
Travelogue and lyrical pieces - 1 star
Montmorency - 3 stars
Av. 3 stars.
March 17, 2024
Three young gentlemen and I use that word very loosely are desperate to get away from the fast pace tensions of every day 19th Century London life ( the horror !). And go someplace else, they should have stayed put indeed. The men need a long rest, they're quite run down but from what though ? The boys don't actually work much, these hypochondriacs I mean sick men just want to have a little fun. J.(Jerome) thinks he has every illness in the book and he's read it too, except housemaid's knee. That J. doesn't have, worries him immensely so leave the city or the end is near thinks the almost wise man. The other members of this desperate, oddball trio are J.'s friends George and Harris , don't forget Montmorency . The liveliest of the group he has four legs, is terribly short with a small tail, angers easily is always ready for a fight. Guarding everyone, this brave young man ( not technically) he's really a fox-terrier. After a considerable discussion a leisurely boat trip (of two weeks) up the Thames River sounds delightful, only smart Montmorency objects. But is outvoted 3 to 1, being a team player the irritated dog sorry Montmorency decides to join the others. They will row and tow and go nothing can be a better vacation? Packing and unpacking causes a little difficulty J, the best at this kind of exercise. And proud of his talents does the honors. While Harris and George lazily look on, comfortably sitting on their big posteriors supervising both sleepily say. They are hard working men no doubt ...The two proclaim numerous times ... Poor J, someone is invariably losing an article so he opens the bag and searches again and again, the humongous thing. I'm afraid the boys got carries away, and putting just a little too much in ... At last the trio...the four, are on the river. Slowly rowing up, their boat struggling against the dangerous current disaster looms everywhere yet now a miracle happens muscles soon develop, they become strong, hardy, brave gentlemen getting fresh air and healthy again ... Two row one steers, ( Montmorency must be the captain) guess which job the boys like the most. Harris has a slight accident, a tumble in the vessel legs up in the air still being such a great sailor stays on board. The picturesque view of the ever changing stream is worth all the trouble ... Small lovely villages, that seem quaint from another era however, I wouldn't drink the water there. Looking ... on the calm brownish river the red sunset, the yellow light shining on the waters, the purple sky above as the dark night closes in and bright stars appearing ... Roughing it on shore sleeping in their boat, with a cozy cover over them just as good as a bed, camping out how grand ... And exceptional entertainment too, a friend's Banjo playing ... doing his best. The singing by all, rather splendid...almost, taking a freezing dip in the inviting river before breakfast, trying to open a can of delicious pineapples unsuccessfully... and seeing how far you could throw it across the Thames ( WHAT SPORT). On the river in the boat as the cold rains come pouring down, drenched together dodging the big steamers and receiving many curses almost killed, yes the fun of it. Luckily Montmorency is there too ... A gentle charming, satire on the English way of life that is no more...very entertaining for people who enjoy people and all their peculiarities.
April 25, 2019
What a brilliant book! If you are looking to the perfect follow up to The Pickwick Papers this is your genre. See what J (the narrator), George (the man with the orange red blazer), Harris and not to be forgotten Montmorency (the dog) experience on their picnic, camping and boat trip on the River Thames through the English countryside. If you know some places of the area described (like me) you see every step in full detail before your mental eye. Those episodes are so funny that you have a broad grin upon your face in every chapter: The episode with the cheese, the anglers' lore with the trout, the failed opening of the can, bad weather and so on (there are also some fine illustrations in the edition I read). Every mishap possible seems to occur to our Pickwickian heroes here. Splendid humour. Or the episode when they came back to London... you simply have to read that episodic book and have one of the best laughs ever. Absolutely recommended!
February 3, 2022
Cuando empecé la lectura de esta novela me encontraba viendo, todavía lo estoy, la serie completa de The office en su versión estadounidense, una de las mejores series cómicas de la historia mundial. Bien, pues poco hay en esa ficción que no estuviera ya en la obra de Jerome... si exceptuamos a la encantadora, bella y delicada Pam.
Salvando ese pequeño aunque no despreciable detalle, esta novela posee una característica que, por inusual, debe ser resaltada y ponderada como se merece. Me refiero, claro está, a que «Tres hombres en una barca» es de esos infrecuentes relatos que, llevando a cuestas durante años la fama de ser muy divertido, resulta ser, en efecto, muy divertido. Pensarán que exagero, que esto es de todo punto insólito, y es cierto, pero no les puedo decir otra cosa sin faltar a la verdad.
Stella Gibbons apunta en el prólogo a la edición de Blackie Books que he tenido el gran placer de leer que uno de los motivos de tan extraño suceso se debe a la satisfacción que lectores de todo el mundo han experimentado durante años al ser testigos del sufrimiento de estos tres personajes, una observación tan perspicaz como muchas de las que encontrarán en la novela, y a la que yo añado otros dos puntos igual de relevantes, a saber, lo hilarante que es observar al prójimo envuelto en situaciones ridículas de las que el prójimo ni siquiera es consciente y la maravillosa sensación que a uno le recorre el cuerpo al corroborar, algo nada sorprendente por otro lado, la siempre infravalorada estupidez ajena.
Todo muy de agradecer pues, al comparar, uno se siente menos mal con la forma en la que la vida le va tratando, a pesar de todo, y lo inteligentes que hemos tenido la suerte de nacer, hechos siempre muy agradables de constatar, y que no se ven empañados por el también imperativo reconocimiento de que hasta sujetos de la catadura de los tres barqueros puedan darnos más de una lección de sentido común y callarnos la boca.
“…los que han hecho la prueba dicen que una conciencia tranquila proporciona felicidad y alegría, pero un estómago lleno consigue los mismos resultados con más facilidad y por menos dinero.”Lo que, sin menospreciar los placeres que proporciona un suculento banquete, también es aplicable al hecho de leer novelas como esta.
"¡Tira el lastre por la borda, compañero! Que la barca de tu vida sea ligera, equipada solo con lo necesario: un hogar sencillo, placeres simples, uno o dos amigos que merezcan tal nombre, alguien a quien amar y alguien que te ame, un perro, un gato, una o dos pipas, lo justo para alimentarte, lo justo para vestirte y un poco más de lo justo para beber, pues la sed es peligrosa."Amén.
May 26, 2010
What a huge moron I was for not giving this book a chance. And now, I just can’t stop praising it. So here it goes…
‘Three Men in a Boat’ is an amusing account of three friends-Jerome(whom I’m in love with),Harris and George and of course their dog Montmorency; while on a little boating expedition. The three of them concur of being overworked and tired of the daily humdrum, are in a dire need of a vacation. After weighing options of a country trip and a sea voyage they settle down on a boat ride to a secluded and peaceful place. So, on a quiet Saturday they rent a boat from Kingston and while picking up George from his workplace they head out on a boating trip up to the River Thames. Right from hiring the boat to scheduling itinerary the story further propels into a comical sketch of various boating and camping mishaps. This is undoubtedly the wittiest and most entertaining book I have ever read. Jerome has a knack for creating even the utter sentimental pieces into this jubilation of jollity and intellect. Not a word passes by without giving a chortle or plastering a wide grin on the face. Every chapter brings with it a plethora of joyous moments and at times a series of wild laughter. The writing is sarcastic with a hint of sharp smartness to the core of my extreme liking.
The comic flavors can be tasted from the beginning, especially when the author introduces the three central characters:-
1. Jerome(the narrator):-Thinks of himself to be a ‘walking hospital’. Jerome a pharmalogical wreck has somehow concluded that he has been inflicted with all sorts of diseases that ever existed by reading various medical pamphlets and imagining their symptoms. What is even hilarious is the mere fact of Jerome being heartbroken for not contracting the Housemaid’s Knee and goes to an extent of calling his doctor a quack for not being able to give it to him.
2.George:- a banker and of whom Jerome says, “George goes to sleep at a bank from ten to four each day, except Saturdays, when they wake him up and put him outside at two”
3.Harris :- “You can never rouse Harris. There is no poetry about Harris - no wild yearning for the unattainable. Harris never "weeps, he knows not why." If Harris's eyes fill with tears, you can bet it is because Harris has been eating raw onions, or has put too much Worcester over his chops.”
In addition, episodes where the author recalls how his Aunt Podger used to take a week long refuge at her mother’s place when Uncle Podger donned the role of a handyman trying to fix “little” things in the house or how the making of Irish Stew from all the leftovers compelled Montmorency to add his bit by bringing a dead-water rat, brims with utmost hilarity.
Reading this book is such bliss that I am already onto its sequel –“Three Men on the Bummel”.
‘Three Men in a Boat’ is an amusing account of three friends-Jerome(whom I’m in love with),Harris and George and of course their dog Montmorency; while on a little boating expedition. The three of them concur of being overworked and tired of the daily humdrum, are in a dire need of a vacation. After weighing options of a country trip and a sea voyage they settle down on a boat ride to a secluded and peaceful place. So, on a quiet Saturday they rent a boat from Kingston and while picking up George from his workplace they head out on a boating trip up to the River Thames. Right from hiring the boat to scheduling itinerary the story further propels into a comical sketch of various boating and camping mishaps. This is undoubtedly the wittiest and most entertaining book I have ever read. Jerome has a knack for creating even the utter sentimental pieces into this jubilation of jollity and intellect. Not a word passes by without giving a chortle or plastering a wide grin on the face. Every chapter brings with it a plethora of joyous moments and at times a series of wild laughter. The writing is sarcastic with a hint of sharp smartness to the core of my extreme liking.
The comic flavors can be tasted from the beginning, especially when the author introduces the three central characters:-
1. Jerome(the narrator):-Thinks of himself to be a ‘walking hospital’. Jerome a pharmalogical wreck has somehow concluded that he has been inflicted with all sorts of diseases that ever existed by reading various medical pamphlets and imagining their symptoms. What is even hilarious is the mere fact of Jerome being heartbroken for not contracting the Housemaid’s Knee and goes to an extent of calling his doctor a quack for not being able to give it to him.
2.George:- a banker and of whom Jerome says, “George goes to sleep at a bank from ten to four each day, except Saturdays, when they wake him up and put him outside at two”
3.Harris :- “You can never rouse Harris. There is no poetry about Harris - no wild yearning for the unattainable. Harris never "weeps, he knows not why." If Harris's eyes fill with tears, you can bet it is because Harris has been eating raw onions, or has put too much Worcester over his chops.”
In addition, episodes where the author recalls how his Aunt Podger used to take a week long refuge at her mother’s place when Uncle Podger donned the role of a handyman trying to fix “little” things in the house or how the making of Irish Stew from all the leftovers compelled Montmorency to add his bit by bringing a dead-water rat, brims with utmost hilarity.
Reading this book is such bliss that I am already onto its sequel –“Three Men on the Bummel”.
Read
September 7, 2022While I was reading this 19th century novel about three men on a boat trip, I traced the course of their journey on a map. They started out from Kingston-on-Thames just outside London and rowed up the river all the way to Oxford, stopping at many places on the way. Each time a place name was mentioned, I plotted it on my map, and so, little by little, I began to see that section of the river Thames as a long piece of rope curling itself into many twists and turns as it stretches half-way across England. Here's what my rope river looks like:
I was fascinated by those twists and turns, and the many lakes and reservoirs that are as if nested in the twists, for all the world like a series of digressions or nested narratives in a larger story. I'm very fond of books with nested narratives. I probably should have a shelf named for such books, I've read so many of them. Books such as Don Quixote, Tristram Shandy, The Sot-Weed Factor, Double or Nothing, in all of which the reader finds themselves propelled by various twists and turns through a series of side stories so that the main story can be completely lost from view—until around a bend it suddenly appears and the reader is back on track. I think Jerome K Jerome must have an equal fondness for such nested narratives. His narrator is given to digressions, his mind wandering off frequently as he thinks on the history of the places he and his two companions pass through, or other adventures he's had with the same companions, to say nothing of Montmorency, the dog he's taken along with him on the journey.
Sometimes, the narrator is so preoccupied with remembering some incident or other that he steers the boat right into the riverbank, and then he, his companions and the dog, to say nothing of the reader, are propelled back into the present moment of the narrative with a crash. Such crashes, upheavals, and entanglements happen so often that it's a wonder the characters ever reach Oxford and attempt the return journey back to Kingston-on-Thames, or at least back to a warm and inviting hostelry half-way there, one with a train station leading to London nearby, so that they can avoid any further rain-soaked nights sleeping under the tent they had rigged up on their rowboat. And, incidentally, the book is so full of good advice on how, for example, to put up a tent on a boat, how to boil water on a paraffin stove in the bow, and how to get ropes untangled, while still remaining good friends with your boat companions, that I thought it would make the perfect (if slightly tattered) gift for a couple I know who had requested a book instead of a congratulations card for their recent wedding—which is how I came to reread this book. As I reread it, I marked up all those practical tips for their attention. Here's another one from the early pages:
The first list we made had to be discarded. It was clear that the upper reaches of the Thames would not allow of the navigation of a boat sufficiently large to take the things we had set down as indispensable; so we tore the list up, and looked at one another. George said: ‘You know we are on the wrong track altogether. We must not think of the things we could do with, but only of the things that we can’t do without.’
How about that for good advice! And the narrator also has an interesting take on living with in-laws:
Between Iffley and Oxford is the most difficult bit of the river I know. You want to be born on that bit of water, to understand it. I have been over it a fairish number of times, but I have never been able to get the hang of it. The man who could row a straight course from Oxford to Iffley ought to be able to live comfortably, under one roof, with his wife, his mother-in-law, his eldest sister, and the servant who was in the family when he was a baby. First the current drives you on to the right bank, and then on to the left, then it takes you out into the middle, turns you round three times, and carries you up-stream again, and always ends by trying to smash you up against a college barge.
And the book doubles as a guide to where not to stay if you ever find yourself time-traveling through that part of England:
Round Clifton Hampden, itself a wonderfully pretty village, old-fashioned, peaceful, and dainty with flowers, the river scenery is rich and beautiful. If you stay the night on land at Clifton, you cannot do better than put up at the ‘Barley Mow’. It is, without exception, I should say, the quaintest, most old-world inn up the river. It stands on the right of the bridge, quite away from the village. Its low-pitched gables and thatched roof and latticed windows give it quite a story-book appearance, while inside it is even still more once-upon-a-timeyfied.
It would not be a good place for the heroine of a modern novel to stay at. The heroine of a modern novel is always ‘divinely tall’, and she is ever ‘drawing herself up to her full height’. At the ‘Barley Mow’ she would bump her head against the ceiling each time she did this. It would also be a bad house for a drunken man to put up at. There are too many surprises in the way of unexpected steps down into this room and up into that; and as for getting upstairs to his bedroom, or ever finding his bed when he got up, either operation would be an utter impossibility to him.
However there's also some advice I made sure to tell the couple to ignore:
The pool under Sandford lasher, just behind the lock, is a very good place to drown yourself in. The undercurrent is terribly strong, and if you once get down into it you are all right. An obelisk marks the spot where two men have already been drowned, while bathing there; and the steps of the obelisk are generally used as a diving-board by young men now who wish to see if the place really is dangerous.
I really think it's the perfect guide for people starting out life together. I mean, you never can tell when you'll find yourself rowing upriver in a small boat in uncertain weather, meeting unforeseen obstacles, and enduring a never-ending series of frustrations of one kind or another. Well, maybe that's taking it too far. But at the very least, the book offers a few sublime reading moments. It seemed to me that the following passage had the rhythm of Longfellow's poetry so I've taken the liberty of breaking up the lines to emphasize the parallel:
The river
– sunlight flashing from its dancing wavelets,
gilding gold the grey-green beech-trunks,
glinting through the dark cool wood paths,
chasing shadows o’er the shallows,
flinging diamonds from the mill-wheels,
throwing kisses to the lilies,
wantoning with the weirs’ white waters,
silvering moss-grown walls and bridges,
brightening every tiny townlet,
making sweet each lane and meadow,
lying tangled in the rushes,
peeping laughing from each inlet,
gleaming gay on many a far sail,
making soft the air with glory
– is a golden fairy stream.
But the river
– chill and weary,
with the ceaseless raindrops falling
on its brown and sluggish waters,
with the sound as of a woman,
weeping low in some dark chamber,
while the woods all dark and silent,
shrouded in their mists of vapour,
stand like ghosts upon the margin;
silent ghosts with eyes reproachful,
like the ghosts of evil actions,
like the ghosts of friends neglected
– is a spirit-haunted water through the land of vain regrets.
Ok, maybe that's too mournful a way to end the review so I'll include the follow-on bit about sunlight:
Sunlight is the life-blood of Nature. Mother Earth looks at us with such dull, soulless eyes, when the sunlight has died away from out of her. It makes us sad to be with her then; she does not seem to know us or to care for us. She is as a widow who has lost the husband she loved, and her children touch her hand, and look up into her eyes, but gain no smile from her.
Perhaps that won't do to finish on either. How about this:
…they must have had very fair notions of the artistic and the beautiful, our great-great-grandfathers. Why, all our art treasures of today are only the dug-up commonplaces of three or four hundred years ago. I wonder if there is any real intrinsic beauty in the old soup-plates, beer-mugs, and candle-snuffers that we prize so now, or if it is only the halo of age glowing around them that gives them their charms in our eyes. The ‘old blue’ that we hang about our walls as ornaments were the common every-day household utensils of a few centuries ago; and the pink shepherds and the yellow shepherdesses that we hand round now for all our friends to gush over, and pretend they understand, were the unvalued mantel-ornaments that the mother of the eighteenth century would have given the baby to suck when he cried. Will it be the same in the future? Will the prized treasures of today always be the cheap trifles of the day before? Will rows of our willow-pattern dinner-plates be ranged above the chimney-pieces of the great in the years 2000 and odd?
Yes, that's a good note to finish on because here we are reading Jerome K Jerome’s rather old-fashioned words in the year '2000 and odd', a year he could only dream of back in 1889, and this tattered old paperback, that I might have thrown out in one of our house moves, may be about to start a new life as a 'prized treasure' on my friends' bookshelf.
I was fascinated by those twists and turns, and the many lakes and reservoirs that are as if nested in the twists, for all the world like a series of digressions or nested narratives in a larger story. I'm very fond of books with nested narratives. I probably should have a shelf named for such books, I've read so many of them. Books such as Don Quixote, Tristram Shandy, The Sot-Weed Factor, Double or Nothing, in all of which the reader finds themselves propelled by various twists and turns through a series of side stories so that the main story can be completely lost from view—until around a bend it suddenly appears and the reader is back on track. I think Jerome K Jerome must have an equal fondness for such nested narratives. His narrator is given to digressions, his mind wandering off frequently as he thinks on the history of the places he and his two companions pass through, or other adventures he's had with the same companions, to say nothing of Montmorency, the dog he's taken along with him on the journey.
Sometimes, the narrator is so preoccupied with remembering some incident or other that he steers the boat right into the riverbank, and then he, his companions and the dog, to say nothing of the reader, are propelled back into the present moment of the narrative with a crash. Such crashes, upheavals, and entanglements happen so often that it's a wonder the characters ever reach Oxford and attempt the return journey back to Kingston-on-Thames, or at least back to a warm and inviting hostelry half-way there, one with a train station leading to London nearby, so that they can avoid any further rain-soaked nights sleeping under the tent they had rigged up on their rowboat. And, incidentally, the book is so full of good advice on how, for example, to put up a tent on a boat, how to boil water on a paraffin stove in the bow, and how to get ropes untangled, while still remaining good friends with your boat companions, that I thought it would make the perfect (if slightly tattered) gift for a couple I know who had requested a book instead of a congratulations card for their recent wedding—which is how I came to reread this book. As I reread it, I marked up all those practical tips for their attention. Here's another one from the early pages:
The first list we made had to be discarded. It was clear that the upper reaches of the Thames would not allow of the navigation of a boat sufficiently large to take the things we had set down as indispensable; so we tore the list up, and looked at one another. George said: ‘You know we are on the wrong track altogether. We must not think of the things we could do with, but only of the things that we can’t do without.’
How about that for good advice! And the narrator also has an interesting take on living with in-laws:
Between Iffley and Oxford is the most difficult bit of the river I know. You want to be born on that bit of water, to understand it. I have been over it a fairish number of times, but I have never been able to get the hang of it. The man who could row a straight course from Oxford to Iffley ought to be able to live comfortably, under one roof, with his wife, his mother-in-law, his eldest sister, and the servant who was in the family when he was a baby. First the current drives you on to the right bank, and then on to the left, then it takes you out into the middle, turns you round three times, and carries you up-stream again, and always ends by trying to smash you up against a college barge.
And the book doubles as a guide to where not to stay if you ever find yourself time-traveling through that part of England:
Round Clifton Hampden, itself a wonderfully pretty village, old-fashioned, peaceful, and dainty with flowers, the river scenery is rich and beautiful. If you stay the night on land at Clifton, you cannot do better than put up at the ‘Barley Mow’. It is, without exception, I should say, the quaintest, most old-world inn up the river. It stands on the right of the bridge, quite away from the village. Its low-pitched gables and thatched roof and latticed windows give it quite a story-book appearance, while inside it is even still more once-upon-a-timeyfied.
It would not be a good place for the heroine of a modern novel to stay at. The heroine of a modern novel is always ‘divinely tall’, and she is ever ‘drawing herself up to her full height’. At the ‘Barley Mow’ she would bump her head against the ceiling each time she did this. It would also be a bad house for a drunken man to put up at. There are too many surprises in the way of unexpected steps down into this room and up into that; and as for getting upstairs to his bedroom, or ever finding his bed when he got up, either operation would be an utter impossibility to him.
However there's also some advice I made sure to tell the couple to ignore:
The pool under Sandford lasher, just behind the lock, is a very good place to drown yourself in. The undercurrent is terribly strong, and if you once get down into it you are all right. An obelisk marks the spot where two men have already been drowned, while bathing there; and the steps of the obelisk are generally used as a diving-board by young men now who wish to see if the place really is dangerous.
I really think it's the perfect guide for people starting out life together. I mean, you never can tell when you'll find yourself rowing upriver in a small boat in uncertain weather, meeting unforeseen obstacles, and enduring a never-ending series of frustrations of one kind or another. Well, maybe that's taking it too far. But at the very least, the book offers a few sublime reading moments. It seemed to me that the following passage had the rhythm of Longfellow's poetry so I've taken the liberty of breaking up the lines to emphasize the parallel:
The river
– sunlight flashing from its dancing wavelets,
gilding gold the grey-green beech-trunks,
glinting through the dark cool wood paths,
chasing shadows o’er the shallows,
flinging diamonds from the mill-wheels,
throwing kisses to the lilies,
wantoning with the weirs’ white waters,
silvering moss-grown walls and bridges,
brightening every tiny townlet,
making sweet each lane and meadow,
lying tangled in the rushes,
peeping laughing from each inlet,
gleaming gay on many a far sail,
making soft the air with glory
– is a golden fairy stream.
But the river
– chill and weary,
with the ceaseless raindrops falling
on its brown and sluggish waters,
with the sound as of a woman,
weeping low in some dark chamber,
while the woods all dark and silent,
shrouded in their mists of vapour,
stand like ghosts upon the margin;
silent ghosts with eyes reproachful,
like the ghosts of evil actions,
like the ghosts of friends neglected
– is a spirit-haunted water through the land of vain regrets.
Ok, maybe that's too mournful a way to end the review so I'll include the follow-on bit about sunlight:
Sunlight is the life-blood of Nature. Mother Earth looks at us with such dull, soulless eyes, when the sunlight has died away from out of her. It makes us sad to be with her then; she does not seem to know us or to care for us. She is as a widow who has lost the husband she loved, and her children touch her hand, and look up into her eyes, but gain no smile from her.
Perhaps that won't do to finish on either. How about this:
…they must have had very fair notions of the artistic and the beautiful, our great-great-grandfathers. Why, all our art treasures of today are only the dug-up commonplaces of three or four hundred years ago. I wonder if there is any real intrinsic beauty in the old soup-plates, beer-mugs, and candle-snuffers that we prize so now, or if it is only the halo of age glowing around them that gives them their charms in our eyes. The ‘old blue’ that we hang about our walls as ornaments were the common every-day household utensils of a few centuries ago; and the pink shepherds and the yellow shepherdesses that we hand round now for all our friends to gush over, and pretend they understand, were the unvalued mantel-ornaments that the mother of the eighteenth century would have given the baby to suck when he cried. Will it be the same in the future? Will the prized treasures of today always be the cheap trifles of the day before? Will rows of our willow-pattern dinner-plates be ranged above the chimney-pieces of the great in the years 2000 and odd?
Yes, that's a good note to finish on because here we are reading Jerome K Jerome’s rather old-fashioned words in the year '2000 and odd', a year he could only dream of back in 1889, and this tattered old paperback, that I might have thrown out in one of our house moves, may be about to start a new life as a 'prized treasure' on my friends' bookshelf.
January 27, 2018
Okay. Right from the beginning, it is a hilarious thing to read. This book was written in 1889, and it is still too funny. According to what I read, at first, it was going to be a travel guide, but that got lost among the humorous anecdotes that took over the whole book. I thank you, Jerome, for that.
So, three men (with a dog) started talking about how ill they were, almost like a contest on who was in the worst shape ever. And then, Jerome said his liver was out of order. Without visiting any doctor, he affirmed that his liver was out of order. How did he know that? Because he read a patent liver-pill circular, in which were detailed all the symptoms. And that single thing was my first hypochondriacal (is that a word?) laugh. I mean, don't most people do that? They feel unwell so they start looking for information, and suddenly they are writing a will because they KNOW it is their last week on earth. Then, if they have any time left, they visit the doctor. So, Jerome read that circular, and on another opportunity, went to the British Museum with the single purpose of reading about diseases (now, we have Wikipedia...).
Anyway, every paragraph is filled with amusing lines; not stupid funny, but witty funny. The thoughts of these hypochondriacs are written in such a way that you are entertained all the way through. Who never experienced "a general disinclination to work of any kind"? Poor boy, he was not lazy, it was his liver!
So, after all this chatting and feeling sorry for themselves, they arrived to the conclusion that all those maladies were caused by overwork. That is why they decided to take a boating holiday. While describing the trip, the author shared a lot of hilarious anecdotes. And I mean, a lot.
The one thing I didn't like that much is the fact that this story seems to be told by a weird creature I named "Seinlet": there can be a funny paragraph narrated by a hilarious Seinfeld and the next one can be so dramatic like a dying Hamlet. It is an abrupt change and I was a bit lost. Jerome’s funny writing and the poetic writing are really good, if they are far, far away from each other, like in different books or something... Otherwise, it can be confusing. At least, it was for me.
I can quote hundreds of passages. My favorite parts are the funny ones, of course. Oh my, how I laughed. I am out of synonyms for “funny” (I think you noticed that). Jerome, you are a new safe place for me.
This is a solid 4.5-star book.
Note: I read this book many months ago... I'm trying to catch up with my reviews.
Aug '13
* Also on my blog.
So, three men (with a dog) started talking about how ill they were, almost like a contest on who was in the worst shape ever. And then, Jerome said his liver was out of order. Without visiting any doctor, he affirmed that his liver was out of order. How did he know that? Because he read a patent liver-pill circular, in which were detailed all the symptoms. And that single thing was my first hypochondriacal (is that a word?) laugh. I mean, don't most people do that? They feel unwell so they start looking for information, and suddenly they are writing a will because they KNOW it is their last week on earth. Then, if they have any time left, they visit the doctor. So, Jerome read that circular, and on another opportunity, went to the British Museum with the single purpose of reading about diseases (now, we have Wikipedia...).
Anyway, every paragraph is filled with amusing lines; not stupid funny, but witty funny. The thoughts of these hypochondriacs are written in such a way that you are entertained all the way through. Who never experienced "a general disinclination to work of any kind"? Poor boy, he was not lazy, it was his liver!
So, after all this chatting and feeling sorry for themselves, they arrived to the conclusion that all those maladies were caused by overwork. That is why they decided to take a boating holiday. While describing the trip, the author shared a lot of hilarious anecdotes. And I mean, a lot.
The one thing I didn't like that much is the fact that this story seems to be told by a weird creature I named "Seinlet": there can be a funny paragraph narrated by a hilarious Seinfeld and the next one can be so dramatic like a dying Hamlet. It is an abrupt change and I was a bit lost. Jerome’s funny writing and the poetic writing are really good, if they are far, far away from each other, like in different books or something... Otherwise, it can be confusing. At least, it was for me.
"I sat for awhile, frozen with horror; and then, in the listlessness of despair, I again turned over the pages. I came to typhoid fever - read the symptoms - discovered that I had typhoid fever, must have had it for months without knowing it - wondered what else I had got; turned up St. Vitus's Dance - found, as I expected, that I had that too, - began to get interested in my case, and determined to sift it to the bottom, and so started alphabetically - read up ague, and learnt that I was sickening for it, and that the acute stage would commence in about another fortnight. Bright's disease, I was relieved to find, I had only in a modified form, and, so far as that was concerned, I might live for years. Cholera I had, with severe complications; and diphtheria I seemed to have been born with. I plodded conscientiously through the twenty-six letters, and the only malady I could conclude I had not got was housemaid's knee.
I felt rather hurt about this at first; it seemed somehow to be a sort of slight. Why hadn't I got housemaid's knee? Why this invidious reservation?"
"From the dim woods on either bank, Night's ghostly army, the grey shadows, creep out with noiseless tread to chase away the lingering rear- guard of the light, and pass, with noiseless, unseen feet, above the waving river-grass, and through the sighing rushes; and Night, upon her somber throne, folds her black wings above the darkening world, and, from her phantom palace, lit by the pale stars, reigns in stillness.
"…we fall asleep beneath the great, still stars, and dream that the world is young again - young and sweet as she used to be ere the centuries of fret and care had furrowed her fair face, ere her children's sins and follies had made old her loving heart - sweet as she was in those bygone days when, a new-made mother, she nursed us, her children, upon her own deep breast - ere the wiles of painted civilization had lured us away from her fond arms, and the poisoned sneers of artificiality had made us ashamed of the simple life we led with her, and the simple, stately home where mankind was born so many thousands years ago."
"But there, everything has its drawbacks, as the man said when his mother-in-law died, and they came down upon him for the funeral expenses."
I can quote hundreds of passages. My favorite parts are the funny ones, of course. Oh my, how I laughed. I am out of synonyms for “funny” (I think you noticed that). Jerome, you are a new safe place for me.
This is a solid 4.5-star book.
Note: I read this book many months ago... I'm trying to catch up with my reviews.
Aug '13
* Also on my blog.
January 9, 2023
1889 English humour
In the church is a memorial to Mrs. Sarah Hill, who bequeathed £1 annually, to be divided at Easter, between two boys and two girls who “have never been undutiful to their parents; who have never been known to swear or to tell untruths, to steal, or to break windows.” Fancy giving up all that for five shillings a year! It is not worth it.
It is rumoured in the town that once, many years ago, a boy appeared who really never had done these things...and thus won the crown of glory. He was exhibited for three weeks afterwards in the Town Hall, under a glass case.
This famous short comic novel is full of the kind of riffing that modern stand-ups do – say, for instance, the famous Rhod Gilbert routine about his luggage at the airport, rather dry, wry and prone to ridiculous deadpan exaggeration, based almost entirely on the observation that in this life everyone irritates everyone else and friends irritate each other the most.
So, three men and a dog bumble around on the River Thames for a fortnight. There’s no story. Quite often the book becomes an actual travel guide :
Round Clifton Hampden, itself a wonderfully pretty village, old-fashioned, peaceful, and dainty with flowers, the river scenery is rich and beautiful. If you stay the night on land at Clifton, you cannot do better than put up at the “Barley Mow.” It is, without exception, I should say, the quaintest, most old-world inn up the river. It stands on the right of the bridge, quite away from the village. Its low-pitched gables and thatched roof and latticed windows give it quite a story-book appearance
and by the way, the Barley Mow still exists, 130 years later
So far no real surprises, but then, it seems, a switch flicks in the mind of JKJ and he totally forgets he’s writing a funny book and starts coming out with this kind of stuff:
The river—with the sunlight flashing from its dancing wavelets, gilding gold the grey-green beech-trunks, glinting through the dark, cool wood paths, chasing shadows o’er the shallows, flinging diamonds from the mill-wheels, throwing kisses to the lilies, wantoning with the weirs’ white waters, silvering moss-grown walls and bridges, brightening every tiny townlet, making sweet each lane and meadow, lying tangled in the rushes, peeping, laughing, from each inlet, gleaming gay on many a far sail, making soft the air with glory—is a golden fairy stream.
And you are going wait, what’s going on, is this a parody? And then he switches back into the whimsical and jovial as if nothing has happened.
The oddest of these bits is when the three jolly chums are suddenly confronted by a dead body floating downriver, that of a woman suicide, they immediately decide:
She had wandered about the woods by the river’s brink all day, and then, when evening fell and the grey twilight spread its dusky robe upon the waters, she stretched her arms out to the silent river that had known her sorrow and her joy. And the old river had taken her into its gentle arms, and had laid her weary head upon its bosom, and had hushed away the pain….
Goring on the left bank and Streatley on the right are both or either charming places to stay at for a few days. The reaches down to Pangbourne woo one for a sunny sail or for a moonlight row, and the country round about is full of beauty. We had intended to push on to Wallingford that day, but the sweet smiling face of the river here lured us to linger for a while; and so we left our boat at the bridge, and went up into Streatley, and lunched at the “Bull,” much to Montmorency’s satisfaction.
Such a crashing of tonal gears - it's the strangest thing I’ve read in a book for a long time. No idea what JKJ thought he was doing. In the middle of the gentle humour it seems, well, really strange.
But otherwise, whimsical, gentle and loveable.
In the church is a memorial to Mrs. Sarah Hill, who bequeathed £1 annually, to be divided at Easter, between two boys and two girls who “have never been undutiful to their parents; who have never been known to swear or to tell untruths, to steal, or to break windows.” Fancy giving up all that for five shillings a year! It is not worth it.
It is rumoured in the town that once, many years ago, a boy appeared who really never had done these things...and thus won the crown of glory. He was exhibited for three weeks afterwards in the Town Hall, under a glass case.
This famous short comic novel is full of the kind of riffing that modern stand-ups do – say, for instance, the famous Rhod Gilbert routine about his luggage at the airport, rather dry, wry and prone to ridiculous deadpan exaggeration, based almost entirely on the observation that in this life everyone irritates everyone else and friends irritate each other the most.
So, three men and a dog bumble around on the River Thames for a fortnight. There’s no story. Quite often the book becomes an actual travel guide :
Round Clifton Hampden, itself a wonderfully pretty village, old-fashioned, peaceful, and dainty with flowers, the river scenery is rich and beautiful. If you stay the night on land at Clifton, you cannot do better than put up at the “Barley Mow.” It is, without exception, I should say, the quaintest, most old-world inn up the river. It stands on the right of the bridge, quite away from the village. Its low-pitched gables and thatched roof and latticed windows give it quite a story-book appearance
and by the way, the Barley Mow still exists, 130 years later
So far no real surprises, but then, it seems, a switch flicks in the mind of JKJ and he totally forgets he’s writing a funny book and starts coming out with this kind of stuff:
The river—with the sunlight flashing from its dancing wavelets, gilding gold the grey-green beech-trunks, glinting through the dark, cool wood paths, chasing shadows o’er the shallows, flinging diamonds from the mill-wheels, throwing kisses to the lilies, wantoning with the weirs’ white waters, silvering moss-grown walls and bridges, brightening every tiny townlet, making sweet each lane and meadow, lying tangled in the rushes, peeping, laughing, from each inlet, gleaming gay on many a far sail, making soft the air with glory—is a golden fairy stream.
And you are going wait, what’s going on, is this a parody? And then he switches back into the whimsical and jovial as if nothing has happened.
The oddest of these bits is when the three jolly chums are suddenly confronted by a dead body floating downriver, that of a woman suicide, they immediately decide:
She had wandered about the woods by the river’s brink all day, and then, when evening fell and the grey twilight spread its dusky robe upon the waters, she stretched her arms out to the silent river that had known her sorrow and her joy. And the old river had taken her into its gentle arms, and had laid her weary head upon its bosom, and had hushed away the pain….
Goring on the left bank and Streatley on the right are both or either charming places to stay at for a few days. The reaches down to Pangbourne woo one for a sunny sail or for a moonlight row, and the country round about is full of beauty. We had intended to push on to Wallingford that day, but the sweet smiling face of the river here lured us to linger for a while; and so we left our boat at the bridge, and went up into Streatley, and lunched at the “Bull,” much to Montmorency’s satisfaction.
Such a crashing of tonal gears - it's the strangest thing I’ve read in a book for a long time. No idea what JKJ thought he was doing. In the middle of the gentle humour it seems, well, really strange.
But otherwise, whimsical, gentle and loveable.
October 12, 2017
One of my ever favourite novels! Unalloyed pleasure to sink into truly English sense of humour! And Montmorency became my idea of a dog!
December 22, 2014
https://clsiewert.wordpress.com/2014/...
I love To Say Nothing of the Dog. Adore it enough to own two copies, a paperback for reading/ lending, and a hardcover for keepsies. Love it enough, in fact, to write a ridiculous review comparing it to a Beethoven symphony (my review). Willis dedicated her book to Heinlein, who “introduced me to Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat.” So when I saw Project Gutenberg offered Three Men in a Boat, I snatched it up.
It is the time of year when I don’t have much time to devote to reading, particularly not long, involved plots with thirty-four funky character names, taking place in imaginary worlds I can’t pronounce (or even in this one, Mr. Jonathan Strange). Three Men seemed perfect for the kind of read I was looking for, and it turned out to be true. But I’m viewing it through the fond lens of a reader of To Say Nothing of the Dog, whose author was clearly amused by Three Men in a Boat, whose own author was riffing on other Victorian tales. So it’s all a bit meta, and I can’t really tell if I love it, or just the spiderweb of connections I feel with the authors.
Let me be honest: there’s virtually no plot. It’s an uneven narrative, flagrantly digressive, in whichBertie, I mean, Jerome, George, William Harris–to say nothing of the dog, Montmorency–are interacting in an Abbott and Costello sort of way as they plan, travel and conclude an idyllic boat ride down the Thames. Narrated by Jerome, the details of the trip are frequently interrupted with humorous asides, commentary on the sights of the Thames and musing on historical sites they are passing. Characterization is about all that holds it together– detail on historical events near the Thames, is frankly, rather yawners, as I am indifferent student of historical events (signing of the Magna what?).
And yet Three Men in a Boat amused me. It could have been the beginning, in which
“We were sitting in my room, smoking, and talking about how bad we were–bad from a medical point of view I mean, of course. … With me, it was my liver that was out of order. I knew it was my liver that was out of order, because I had just been reading a patent liver-pill circular, in which were detailed the various symptoms by which a man could tell when his liver was out of order. I had them all. It is a most extraordinary thing, but I never read a patent medical advertisement without being impelled to the conclusion that I am suffering from the particular disease therein dealt with in its most virulent form.“
Though written in 1889, it indirectly emphasized to me, a nurse, that the more things change, the more they stay the same. I think that’s why the characterization appeals so much. The three men bear a strong resemblance to people we all know; in fact, I was rather reminded of Jerry, George and Kramer, whose own self-absorbed behavior provided so many laughs. For instance, after Jerome tells a story about another man watching him work, he comments:
“Now, I’m not like that. I can’t sit still and see another man slaving and working. I want to get up and superintend, and walk round with my hands in my pockets, and tell him what to do. It is my energetic nature. I can’t help it.“
As a dog person, I couldn’t get enough of the sassy, spirited Montmorency:
“We went downstairs to breakfast. Montmorency had invited two other dogs to come and see him off, and they were whiling away the time by fighting on the doorstep. We calmed them with an umbrella, and sat down to chops and cold beef.“
But it wasn’t all irony and laughter, there were moments of quite lyrical, perhaps even indulgent writing (to take a line from Willis: “a tendency to maudlin sentimentality, like… a Victorian poet cold-sober”):
“In the sunlight–in the daytime, when Nature is alive and busy all around us, we like the open hillsides and the deep woods well enough: but in the night, when our Mother Earth has gone to sleep, and left us waking, oh! the world seems so lonesome, and we get frightened, like children in a silent house.The we sit and sob, and long for the gas-lit streets, and the sound of human voices, and the answering throb of human life. We feel so helpless and so little in the great stillness, when the dark trees rustle in the night-wind.“
Without doubt, it kept me entertained. Read in small doses before bedtime, it perhaps started to feel a little like the three men experiencing the Thames: interesting, humorous, thoughtful, and perhaps just a day or two too long. Hopefully, the above quotes give enough of a flavor to see if it will appeal. For me, I’m looking forward to my next read of To Say Nothing of the Dog; with the insight I’ve gotten from Three Men, I expect it to be even more amusing.
I love To Say Nothing of the Dog. Adore it enough to own two copies, a paperback for reading/ lending, and a hardcover for keepsies. Love it enough, in fact, to write a ridiculous review comparing it to a Beethoven symphony (my review). Willis dedicated her book to Heinlein, who “introduced me to Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat.” So when I saw Project Gutenberg offered Three Men in a Boat, I snatched it up.
It is the time of year when I don’t have much time to devote to reading, particularly not long, involved plots with thirty-four funky character names, taking place in imaginary worlds I can’t pronounce (or even in this one, Mr. Jonathan Strange). Three Men seemed perfect for the kind of read I was looking for, and it turned out to be true. But I’m viewing it through the fond lens of a reader of To Say Nothing of the Dog, whose author was clearly amused by Three Men in a Boat, whose own author was riffing on other Victorian tales. So it’s all a bit meta, and I can’t really tell if I love it, or just the spiderweb of connections I feel with the authors.
Let me be honest: there’s virtually no plot. It’s an uneven narrative, flagrantly digressive, in which
And yet Three Men in a Boat amused me. It could have been the beginning, in which
“We were sitting in my room, smoking, and talking about how bad we were–bad from a medical point of view I mean, of course. … With me, it was my liver that was out of order. I knew it was my liver that was out of order, because I had just been reading a patent liver-pill circular, in which were detailed the various symptoms by which a man could tell when his liver was out of order. I had them all. It is a most extraordinary thing, but I never read a patent medical advertisement without being impelled to the conclusion that I am suffering from the particular disease therein dealt with in its most virulent form.“
Though written in 1889, it indirectly emphasized to me, a nurse, that the more things change, the more they stay the same. I think that’s why the characterization appeals so much. The three men bear a strong resemblance to people we all know; in fact, I was rather reminded of Jerry, George and Kramer, whose own self-absorbed behavior provided so many laughs. For instance, after Jerome tells a story about another man watching him work, he comments:
“Now, I’m not like that. I can’t sit still and see another man slaving and working. I want to get up and superintend, and walk round with my hands in my pockets, and tell him what to do. It is my energetic nature. I can’t help it.“
As a dog person, I couldn’t get enough of the sassy, spirited Montmorency:
“We went downstairs to breakfast. Montmorency had invited two other dogs to come and see him off, and they were whiling away the time by fighting on the doorstep. We calmed them with an umbrella, and sat down to chops and cold beef.“
But it wasn’t all irony and laughter, there were moments of quite lyrical, perhaps even indulgent writing (to take a line from Willis: “a tendency to maudlin sentimentality, like… a Victorian poet cold-sober”):
“In the sunlight–in the daytime, when Nature is alive and busy all around us, we like the open hillsides and the deep woods well enough: but in the night, when our Mother Earth has gone to sleep, and left us waking, oh! the world seems so lonesome, and we get frightened, like children in a silent house.The we sit and sob, and long for the gas-lit streets, and the sound of human voices, and the answering throb of human life. We feel so helpless and so little in the great stillness, when the dark trees rustle in the night-wind.“
Without doubt, it kept me entertained. Read in small doses before bedtime, it perhaps started to feel a little like the three men experiencing the Thames: interesting, humorous, thoughtful, and perhaps just a day or two too long. Hopefully, the above quotes give enough of a flavor to see if it will appeal. For me, I’m looking forward to my next read of To Say Nothing of the Dog; with the insight I’ve gotten from Three Men, I expect it to be even more amusing.
December 28, 2018
i have a friend named Albert. once, long ago, i was matched with him as a volunteer to provide him 'peer support'. our relationship as volunteer and client continued semi-happily for many years, until i started working for the agency that oversees these volunteer matches. when that match officially ended, we remained friends - although it is important to point out that the relationship continued within the same format: mainly me listening to him. Albert tells many uproarious anecdotes. he's a funny guy - a senior citizen with many tales to tell, a bitchy queen with many hilariously scathing remarks at his disposal, an opera lover and antique-collector who has educated me on these two topics (ones in which i had virtually no understanding). Albert knows how to TALK. he calls me almost daily with incredibly long-winded but often very wry stories, and during my visits it is story after story after story. i don't begrudge him any of this in the slightest - he's a lonely old man and i'm glad to support him. i love him. but gosh, at times it can get a wee bit wearying.
Three Men in a Boat is like listening to Albert, except instead of an elderly gay man complaining about aches & pains and full of digressive but amusing anecdotes about life or whatever, the narrator is a young straight man complaining about aches & pains and full of digressive but amusing anecdotes about life or whatever. there are a lot of hilarious moments. there are even some moments that are moving or even full of beauty (well, two of them, prior to my page 100 stopping-point). but golly, it gets tiring. there is so little point to it all! just semi-amusing tale after tale, on and on and on, with virtually no movement. so very static. for example, over seven pages of 'amusing anecdotes' about tow-lines! really? Jerome K. Jerome, were you getting paid by the word?
so i am doing what i could never possibly imagine doing to my dear Albert: i am walking out of the room, i am hanging up, i am ending this one-sided conversation. Jerome K. Jerome seems like a charming, sweet-natured man, but he is not my friend and i refuse to continue to provide empathetic active listening to a nice guy who is also, at times, such a bore. Jerome - sad to say - you're no Albert. his stories are more entertaining and he has a whole lifetime under his belt. that reminds me, i should call him back now.
still, the writing in Three Men IS dryly amusing, i'll give it that.
post-script: after reading miriam's comment below, i hustled back to the book to find this passage. it is about a page and a half, starting at the bottom of page 159. the three young men come across the body of a woman floating in the river and are later told her sad and moving story. it is a surprising change of tone for such a light-hearted, comedic novel of anecdotes. well worth seeking out, even if you are the kind of impatient reader, like myself, who gave up on the book.
Three Men in a Boat is like listening to Albert, except instead of an elderly gay man complaining about aches & pains and full of digressive but amusing anecdotes about life or whatever, the narrator is a young straight man complaining about aches & pains and full of digressive but amusing anecdotes about life or whatever. there are a lot of hilarious moments. there are even some moments that are moving or even full of beauty (well, two of them, prior to my page 100 stopping-point). but golly, it gets tiring. there is so little point to it all! just semi-amusing tale after tale, on and on and on, with virtually no movement. so very static. for example, over seven pages of 'amusing anecdotes' about tow-lines! really? Jerome K. Jerome, were you getting paid by the word?
so i am doing what i could never possibly imagine doing to my dear Albert: i am walking out of the room, i am hanging up, i am ending this one-sided conversation. Jerome K. Jerome seems like a charming, sweet-natured man, but he is not my friend and i refuse to continue to provide empathetic active listening to a nice guy who is also, at times, such a bore. Jerome - sad to say - you're no Albert. his stories are more entertaining and he has a whole lifetime under his belt. that reminds me, i should call him back now.
still, the writing in Three Men IS dryly amusing, i'll give it that.
post-script: after reading miriam's comment below, i hustled back to the book to find this passage. it is about a page and a half, starting at the bottom of page 159. the three young men come across the body of a woman floating in the river and are later told her sad and moving story. it is a surprising change of tone for such a light-hearted, comedic novel of anecdotes. well worth seeking out, even if you are the kind of impatient reader, like myself, who gave up on the book.
August 20, 2020
Uhhh a mogło być tak dobrze. Anegdota na dygresji i anegdocie. Tak tego dużo, że nie widac już nawet wątku głównego. Nie moja lektura :(
March 10, 2017
Three Men in a Pastiche: To Say Nothing of the Boat
Three tourists - A spicy meal - The effects of a typhoon - Picasso's masterpiece - Random thoughts on helicopters - The joys of being on land
Three young men were waiting at the docks to be picked up by a ferry boat. The first of these men is Ted, a man widely praised for his lust for action. It is in his hands, his feet, his nose and other such things that the essence of his being lies. He is said to be the only man who is able to act more quickly than he thinks, regardless of the fact that he does the latter so swiftly that many seem to doubt he does any thinking at all. This ability is most surprising in combination with his stubbornness to survive the whole business that is life with such bravado. He's a decentralised affair that would send many great communists in a frenzy, with his left hand doing a complicated thing with a phone while talking to a woman while his right eye is looking at his left foot as it kicks someone in the behind, with no apparent logic threading these disparate actions together into what one hopes can be called a "harmonious life" at the end of it all.
The second man whose behind was just briefly mentioned is Earl. Earl is of a different nature altogether, so while his brother is widely praised for action, he is widely praised for nothing whatsoever. That is in part because kind hearts receive no praise in these cold and vicious times and because in a world where actions speak louder than words, he's got nothing to speak for him. He thinks before he acts, but he does the former so slowly that many seem to doubt he does any thinking at all, thereby allowing observers to give credence to the notion that he is his brother's brother after all.
The third man who was accompanying these brothers is what one could call the happy medium, though he himself prefers to be referred to as the Golden Mean, since it has got a far less mundane ring to it. An astute observer with a charm that has enthralled entire ballrooms, a companionable polymath with the kind of razor-sharp wit that enlivens many conversations, a man that couples thinking to action like internet dating sites couple lovers to psychopaths, he is a man that is mostly known for his humility despite his many other talents. That third and quite frankly ravishingly handsome man is, as you may have surmised, your humble narrator.
As we were sitting at the dock waiting for the ferry boat that would take us from one paradisiac island to the next, a pang of hunger got the better of me. A small food stand that was intelligently placed in the vicinity of the waiting space caught my attention and I sped towards it as rapidly as a crocodile would chase Louis Vuitton. Earl shouted some warnings as I went, relating to the poor quality of the overpriced food and the questionable hygiene and other such trifles that are exceedingly insignificant to a hungry man. I ordered some noodles with chicken and upon being asked if I wanted it spicy I requested it to be the Golden Mean of Spicy, where small tears of joy well up as your throat emits a gentle warmth and your tongue tingles in delight. Despite this elaborate explanation the vendor had misconstrued my meaning and served me with what once were the contents of the now dormant Mount Vesuvius. Appearances would have it that this devious man had scooped up the insides of this legendary volcano and decided to pour them on my chicken noodles in great quantities. I would have uttered an objection to his recipe, had it not been that my voice had made way for a column of blazing hellfire that only the steady stream of my salty tears could hope to put out. Miraculously I averted slipping into a coma and made my way back to my friends, just in time to get on the boat. As I regained the first traces of the power of thought, I ruminated on those tales of firebreathing dragons and thought it very logical that they always seemed in such bad spirits and further considered it to their benefit that they hadn't been expected to actually exist.
It was a big ferry, and a fast one, if one could trust the pictures that adorned its flanks. On them the ferry was flying over the whiteheaded waves across a sky blurry with birds, clouds and rays of light. It was a white streak across a blue canvas that would make the most celebrated action painter, if ever there were such a thing, envious. As we settled down in the seats I mentioned to my friends that I have been known to get seasick, both as a warning as well as a supplication for comfort. I was met with a boatload of encouraging remarks. Ted pointed to the sunny sky and said that if the weather would be any calmer it would be mistaken for Earl. Earl pointed to the tiny waves and said that the only thing that could stir up a sea so calm would be Ted's feet after a cup of coffee. Thus it was with an easy mind that I heard the engines start up and we left the safety of the docks.
Not five minutes had passed since we left the island when the sea changed its mind. Even though it was leisurely bathing in the sun only moments before, it now seemed to get itself into quite a state, as if suddenly recalling an important deadline or being roused up by a hysterical pregnant woman during an otherwise peaceful Sunday afternoon. As the waves got higher and the bumps got rougher, my visage must have gone through fifty shades of green. It had just settled on pistachio green with touches of grey and yellow when Ted and Earl gave me some concerned looks. Ted, who was sitting next to me, seemed mostly concerned for his trousers being in the line of fire in case my disconcerting complexion was but the forerunner of more imposing symptoms, while Earl himself didn't seem to possess the iron stomach he thought he did. Ted decided to get up on the roof of the ferry and get some fresh air, while Earl settled for a trip to the head. For some reason boats don't have kitchens or toilets but consist of "galleys" and "heads" instead. I have since come to believe these terms find their ancestors in the words "gallows" and "beheadings" and other such references to painful deaths, considering the entire construction makes one consider public executions as a blissful means of escape from that infernal vessel. To add insult to injury the seafaring folk devised the system of "nautical miles", giving false hope with regards to the distance one needs to traverse before being once again graced with land under one's feet.
I would have gotten up as well and followed my companions outside, if only to throw myself into the sea under a lonely cry of despair, had not the adage of "you are what you eat" proved itself to be true as my legs slowly turned into the limp noodles I had eaten only moments before. A voice on the intercom informed the passengers of a typhoon that had been raging many miles away, a natural disaster of which we were now feeling the comparably tiny side effects. I had heard of the effect a small flutter of a butterfly's wings could have over great distances, so it came as no surprise that a typhoon should bring about catastrophic consequences on my feeble constitution. In response to the storm that had raged over fisherman's villages and quaint coastlines far away, ruining shelters and holidays alike, my stomach churned in empathy and cried for a prompt evacuation of its own residents. I've always thought of myself as a kind man with a good heart, but it appears that my stomach is my most sympathetic organ. It made me wonder if all that connected the wise and noble prophets of our great religions was that they all had a weak stomach in the face of misery, rather than a heart of gold.
One of the seamen with a keen eye for discoloured faces had offered me a black, plastic bag that reeked of chemicals. Before I could even consider the idea of wrapping it over my head and letting the lack of oxygen put me out of my wretchedness, I had filled it up with my lunch, sadly noting that it had lost none of its spicy spunk before its return voyage. The fire was back and with a vengeance, as this time it seemed to have found the way through my nose as well. I cried silent and bitter sobs, my eyes red with burning tears, my cheeks grey, my forehead yellow and my chin dripping with green drops hovering over a black bag. I fancy I must have looked like my portrait if I had chosen to commission it to Pablo Picasso.
In the meanwhile Earl had ventured outside and apparently had had the same idea to simply jump into the sea and hope that Heaven was a real place. He had lost his nerve at the last moment and held to the railing while being splashed by the cold water and attacked by an evil wind. Trembling, he welcomed this agony as it made him forget the reality of Hell that was his own body. His belly seemed to host the devil himself and all his minions, intent on entering this world post-haste. During the first convulsions Earl somehow still had the clarity of mind and the good fortune to find a vacant toilet bowl and lay next to it as long as necessary. He locked himself in and didn't mind the outrage of all the people, equally sick, rapping on the door. If this torment would last much longer he would offer himself up as a sacrifice to the murderous mass and do it all with a contented smile.
On the upper deck Ted was feeling a bit queasy. He resolved to look at the horizon and fell asleep shortly after.
I was working on filling up my fifth bag and had already gone over all possible solutions. Jumping off the boat was no longer an option and I could find no way to the Gates of Heaven with the limited tools at my disposal. No matter how hard I wished for a gun, the only thing that would be delivered was another plastic bag. Even though the evacuation of my stomach had been a resounding success, with not a single entity still present in that godforsaken place, the safety mechanisms seemed to prefer to make absolutely certain no noodle would be left behind. I think I have left my very soul in that last bag. Given the absence, thanks to lazy scientists all over the world, of immediate teleportation, my only hope was a helicopter, swooping down from the sky like an angel and taking me to golden shores. Who would have thought that such a ludicrous contraption would be the main flicker of hope during my darkest times? It looks like a curiously constructed metallic fish with a sad flower on its head, whirring through the skies in search of a place where it doesn't look ridiculous. Finding that such a place does not exist, some good souls resolved to paint big white circles with an "H" in the middle to give the mechanical monstrosity at least some semblance of a home. And yet it was this silly thing that I longed for in my last and most difficult moments on that diabolical boat on an equally satanic sea.
After what according to my estimations must have been twenty-six eternities, we finally reached the harbour and were assisted to come to land. Once there it was with surprising ease that I found the will to live again, which was followed up by a healthy appetite and the desire to share my story with my companions. Earl had easily made his way through the angry mob, for they had helpfully decided to collapse outside of the toilet in a last effort to get the better of the motions of the sea. We looked into each other's eyes and found therein the understanding that we had been in hell, and survived. Ted merely agreed by saying that he found the trip, on the whole, rather uncomfortable, and that it would probably be best if we took a plane for the return trip. However aggravating his equanimity, both Earl and I hugged him in a moment of joyous relief and didn't let go until he punched us both in the ear. Oh, we were so happy, happy to live, happy to be on land, happy to note that regardless of everything that ferry had put us through, it did deliver on its promise to take us to Paradise.
Three tourists - A spicy meal - The effects of a typhoon - Picasso's masterpiece - Random thoughts on helicopters - The joys of being on land
Three young men were waiting at the docks to be picked up by a ferry boat. The first of these men is Ted, a man widely praised for his lust for action. It is in his hands, his feet, his nose and other such things that the essence of his being lies. He is said to be the only man who is able to act more quickly than he thinks, regardless of the fact that he does the latter so swiftly that many seem to doubt he does any thinking at all. This ability is most surprising in combination with his stubbornness to survive the whole business that is life with such bravado. He's a decentralised affair that would send many great communists in a frenzy, with his left hand doing a complicated thing with a phone while talking to a woman while his right eye is looking at his left foot as it kicks someone in the behind, with no apparent logic threading these disparate actions together into what one hopes can be called a "harmonious life" at the end of it all.
The second man whose behind was just briefly mentioned is Earl. Earl is of a different nature altogether, so while his brother is widely praised for action, he is widely praised for nothing whatsoever. That is in part because kind hearts receive no praise in these cold and vicious times and because in a world where actions speak louder than words, he's got nothing to speak for him. He thinks before he acts, but he does the former so slowly that many seem to doubt he does any thinking at all, thereby allowing observers to give credence to the notion that he is his brother's brother after all.
The third man who was accompanying these brothers is what one could call the happy medium, though he himself prefers to be referred to as the Golden Mean, since it has got a far less mundane ring to it. An astute observer with a charm that has enthralled entire ballrooms, a companionable polymath with the kind of razor-sharp wit that enlivens many conversations, a man that couples thinking to action like internet dating sites couple lovers to psychopaths, he is a man that is mostly known for his humility despite his many other talents. That third and quite frankly ravishingly handsome man is, as you may have surmised, your humble narrator.
As we were sitting at the dock waiting for the ferry boat that would take us from one paradisiac island to the next, a pang of hunger got the better of me. A small food stand that was intelligently placed in the vicinity of the waiting space caught my attention and I sped towards it as rapidly as a crocodile would chase Louis Vuitton. Earl shouted some warnings as I went, relating to the poor quality of the overpriced food and the questionable hygiene and other such trifles that are exceedingly insignificant to a hungry man. I ordered some noodles with chicken and upon being asked if I wanted it spicy I requested it to be the Golden Mean of Spicy, where small tears of joy well up as your throat emits a gentle warmth and your tongue tingles in delight. Despite this elaborate explanation the vendor had misconstrued my meaning and served me with what once were the contents of the now dormant Mount Vesuvius. Appearances would have it that this devious man had scooped up the insides of this legendary volcano and decided to pour them on my chicken noodles in great quantities. I would have uttered an objection to his recipe, had it not been that my voice had made way for a column of blazing hellfire that only the steady stream of my salty tears could hope to put out. Miraculously I averted slipping into a coma and made my way back to my friends, just in time to get on the boat. As I regained the first traces of the power of thought, I ruminated on those tales of firebreathing dragons and thought it very logical that they always seemed in such bad spirits and further considered it to their benefit that they hadn't been expected to actually exist.
It was a big ferry, and a fast one, if one could trust the pictures that adorned its flanks. On them the ferry was flying over the whiteheaded waves across a sky blurry with birds, clouds and rays of light. It was a white streak across a blue canvas that would make the most celebrated action painter, if ever there were such a thing, envious. As we settled down in the seats I mentioned to my friends that I have been known to get seasick, both as a warning as well as a supplication for comfort. I was met with a boatload of encouraging remarks. Ted pointed to the sunny sky and said that if the weather would be any calmer it would be mistaken for Earl. Earl pointed to the tiny waves and said that the only thing that could stir up a sea so calm would be Ted's feet after a cup of coffee. Thus it was with an easy mind that I heard the engines start up and we left the safety of the docks.
Not five minutes had passed since we left the island when the sea changed its mind. Even though it was leisurely bathing in the sun only moments before, it now seemed to get itself into quite a state, as if suddenly recalling an important deadline or being roused up by a hysterical pregnant woman during an otherwise peaceful Sunday afternoon. As the waves got higher and the bumps got rougher, my visage must have gone through fifty shades of green. It had just settled on pistachio green with touches of grey and yellow when Ted and Earl gave me some concerned looks. Ted, who was sitting next to me, seemed mostly concerned for his trousers being in the line of fire in case my disconcerting complexion was but the forerunner of more imposing symptoms, while Earl himself didn't seem to possess the iron stomach he thought he did. Ted decided to get up on the roof of the ferry and get some fresh air, while Earl settled for a trip to the head. For some reason boats don't have kitchens or toilets but consist of "galleys" and "heads" instead. I have since come to believe these terms find their ancestors in the words "gallows" and "beheadings" and other such references to painful deaths, considering the entire construction makes one consider public executions as a blissful means of escape from that infernal vessel. To add insult to injury the seafaring folk devised the system of "nautical miles", giving false hope with regards to the distance one needs to traverse before being once again graced with land under one's feet.
I would have gotten up as well and followed my companions outside, if only to throw myself into the sea under a lonely cry of despair, had not the adage of "you are what you eat" proved itself to be true as my legs slowly turned into the limp noodles I had eaten only moments before. A voice on the intercom informed the passengers of a typhoon that had been raging many miles away, a natural disaster of which we were now feeling the comparably tiny side effects. I had heard of the effect a small flutter of a butterfly's wings could have over great distances, so it came as no surprise that a typhoon should bring about catastrophic consequences on my feeble constitution. In response to the storm that had raged over fisherman's villages and quaint coastlines far away, ruining shelters and holidays alike, my stomach churned in empathy and cried for a prompt evacuation of its own residents. I've always thought of myself as a kind man with a good heart, but it appears that my stomach is my most sympathetic organ. It made me wonder if all that connected the wise and noble prophets of our great religions was that they all had a weak stomach in the face of misery, rather than a heart of gold.
One of the seamen with a keen eye for discoloured faces had offered me a black, plastic bag that reeked of chemicals. Before I could even consider the idea of wrapping it over my head and letting the lack of oxygen put me out of my wretchedness, I had filled it up with my lunch, sadly noting that it had lost none of its spicy spunk before its return voyage. The fire was back and with a vengeance, as this time it seemed to have found the way through my nose as well. I cried silent and bitter sobs, my eyes red with burning tears, my cheeks grey, my forehead yellow and my chin dripping with green drops hovering over a black bag. I fancy I must have looked like my portrait if I had chosen to commission it to Pablo Picasso.
In the meanwhile Earl had ventured outside and apparently had had the same idea to simply jump into the sea and hope that Heaven was a real place. He had lost his nerve at the last moment and held to the railing while being splashed by the cold water and attacked by an evil wind. Trembling, he welcomed this agony as it made him forget the reality of Hell that was his own body. His belly seemed to host the devil himself and all his minions, intent on entering this world post-haste. During the first convulsions Earl somehow still had the clarity of mind and the good fortune to find a vacant toilet bowl and lay next to it as long as necessary. He locked himself in and didn't mind the outrage of all the people, equally sick, rapping on the door. If this torment would last much longer he would offer himself up as a sacrifice to the murderous mass and do it all with a contented smile.
On the upper deck Ted was feeling a bit queasy. He resolved to look at the horizon and fell asleep shortly after.
I was working on filling up my fifth bag and had already gone over all possible solutions. Jumping off the boat was no longer an option and I could find no way to the Gates of Heaven with the limited tools at my disposal. No matter how hard I wished for a gun, the only thing that would be delivered was another plastic bag. Even though the evacuation of my stomach had been a resounding success, with not a single entity still present in that godforsaken place, the safety mechanisms seemed to prefer to make absolutely certain no noodle would be left behind. I think I have left my very soul in that last bag. Given the absence, thanks to lazy scientists all over the world, of immediate teleportation, my only hope was a helicopter, swooping down from the sky like an angel and taking me to golden shores. Who would have thought that such a ludicrous contraption would be the main flicker of hope during my darkest times? It looks like a curiously constructed metallic fish with a sad flower on its head, whirring through the skies in search of a place where it doesn't look ridiculous. Finding that such a place does not exist, some good souls resolved to paint big white circles with an "H" in the middle to give the mechanical monstrosity at least some semblance of a home. And yet it was this silly thing that I longed for in my last and most difficult moments on that diabolical boat on an equally satanic sea.
After what according to my estimations must have been twenty-six eternities, we finally reached the harbour and were assisted to come to land. Once there it was with surprising ease that I found the will to live again, which was followed up by a healthy appetite and the desire to share my story with my companions. Earl had easily made his way through the angry mob, for they had helpfully decided to collapse outside of the toilet in a last effort to get the better of the motions of the sea. We looked into each other's eyes and found therein the understanding that we had been in hell, and survived. Ted merely agreed by saying that he found the trip, on the whole, rather uncomfortable, and that it would probably be best if we took a plane for the return trip. However aggravating his equanimity, both Earl and I hugged him in a moment of joyous relief and didn't let go until he punched us both in the ear. Oh, we were so happy, happy to live, happy to be on land, happy to note that regardless of everything that ferry had put us through, it did deliver on its promise to take us to Paradise.
March 31, 2018
What a quaint little book!
I had no idea this existed. But I'm definitely glad I could rectify that now.
The story is that of three friends, elderly gentlemen, who decide to journey up the Thames in a little boat together with the dog one of them owns. The preparations for the trip are already very entertaining, but the trip itself is no less so. Apart from them actually travelling for a bit, we are treated to various stops along the way (I looked a few places up on a map and was delighted to see there are indeed so many interesting places along the river). During the voyage as well as the stops, there are some reminiscences, childhood memories as well as later encounters, from all three. All while they are stumbling about. You might have guessed that not only do they encounter a bit of bad luck, their own helplessness and the fact that they don't actually know what they are doing isn't helping either.
The characters (the dog definitely being one of them) are very quirky. It's basically the story of three old(er) grumpy men travelling together with a dog, having some mishaps on the way. The way it was told was light and quite modern so the age of the book actually surprises.
Seeing society through the eyes of the three friends (and the dog) was very funny and the light way the story is told in that is nonetheless full of dry humour makes it clear why this book was an instant success back when it was first published.
Once again, I've chosen the audioversion and am glad for it because although I do not have the version narrated by Hugh Laurie, it was wonderful to have this story brought to life with the proper British accent.
I had no idea this existed. But I'm definitely glad I could rectify that now.
The story is that of three friends, elderly gentlemen, who decide to journey up the Thames in a little boat together with the dog one of them owns. The preparations for the trip are already very entertaining, but the trip itself is no less so. Apart from them actually travelling for a bit, we are treated to various stops along the way (I looked a few places up on a map and was delighted to see there are indeed so many interesting places along the river). During the voyage as well as the stops, there are some reminiscences, childhood memories as well as later encounters, from all three. All while they are stumbling about. You might have guessed that not only do they encounter a bit of bad luck, their own helplessness and the fact that they don't actually know what they are doing isn't helping either.
The characters (the dog definitely being one of them) are very quirky. It's basically the story of three old(er) grumpy men travelling together with a dog, having some mishaps on the way. The way it was told was light and quite modern so the age of the book actually surprises.
Seeing society through the eyes of the three friends (and the dog) was very funny and the light way the story is told in that is nonetheless full of dry humour makes it clear why this book was an instant success back when it was first published.
Once again, I've chosen the audioversion and am glad for it because although I do not have the version narrated by Hugh Laurie, it was wonderful to have this story brought to life with the proper British accent.
June 26, 2021
"It was the best of ideas, it was the worst of ideas."
Three men who are the best of friends agree they are overworked and need rest. They hit on the best of ideas – to take a boating vacation on the Thames from Kingston upon Thames to Oxford and back to Kingston. Two weeks on ‘the rolling deep’ sounds like fun.
The narrator, J. (the author himself), George, Harris, and Montmorency, make plans to go up the river for ‘fresh air, exercise and quiet.’ They expect to work up a good appetite and to sleep well. I wondered why the title was Three Men In A Boat when four names were mentioned. Then I learned in Chapter 2 that Montmorency is a dog and every inch as loony as the three men.
That this getaway may turn out to be the worst of ideas began as soon the party sat down to pack for the trip. It was hilarious watching them throw together food, clothing, a kettle, and a whole barrage of paraphernalia they need. There was J. obsessing that he has forgotten to pack his toothbrush, with endless opening and closing of luggage to check and check again. I thought they will never get off for the trip. Finally, 'Home at last on the waters for two weeks!' I was really excited for them.
As one would expect, they bicker and fight over who will scull and tow the boat, cook the meals, and wash up, and where to camp for the night. I laughed reading about three men who cannot peel a potato to save their lives trying to cook an Irish stew. And to think they half contemplated adding to the garish concoction a water rat offered by Montmorency. Then there is a tantalizing can of pineapples they long to eat and they have no can opener. Oh, that episode was priceless.
Folks who have spent time boating down a weir will appreciate the demands of sculling and towing, and the misadventures that can happen. With the three men, everything that can go wrong goes diabolically wrong. I felt relief whenever their boat was safely anchored and they could finally settle down for supper.
Comedy aside, this is an interesting travelogue that carries some gorgeous description of scenery along the Thames. I googled the Knight Templars and the Bisham Abbey, once home to Anne of Cleves and Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth). I looked up pictures of a double-sculling skiff and even watched a Youtube video of how to work a lock on a river.
When the novel ended, I was sorry that the trip was over. But I suspect the three men and their dog were hugely relieved. What an unholy, madcap trinity plus one lovable dog!
Some quotes which I enjoyed:
A new day
‘It was a glorious morning, late spring or early summer, as you care to take it, when the dainty sheen of grass and leaf is blushing to a deeper green; and the year seems like a fair young maid, trembling with strange, wakening pulses on the brink of womanhood.’
Making tea
‘We put the kettle on to boil, up in the nose of the boat, … and pretended to take no notice of it… That is the only way to get a kettle to boil up the river. If it sees that you are waiting for it and are anxious, it will never even sing. You have to go away and begin your meal, as if you were not going to have any tea at all. You must not even look round at it. Then you will soon hear it sputtering away, mad to be made into tea.’
After a meal
‘How good one feels when one is full - how satisfied with ourselves and with the world! People who have tried it, tell me that a clear conscience makes you very happy and contented; but a full stomach does the business quite well, and is cheaper, and more easily obtained. One feels so forgiving and generous after a substantial and well-digested meal - so noble-minded, so kindly-hearted.’
Night
‘Night’s heart is full of pity for us: she cannot ease our aching; she takes our hand in hers, and the little world grows very small and very far away beneath us, and borne on her dark wings, we pass for a moment into a mightier Presence than her own, and in the wondrous light of that great Presence, all human life lies like a book before us, and we know that Pain and Sorrow are but the angels of God.’
Work
‘I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.’
Three men who are the best of friends agree they are overworked and need rest. They hit on the best of ideas – to take a boating vacation on the Thames from Kingston upon Thames to Oxford and back to Kingston. Two weeks on ‘the rolling deep’ sounds like fun.
The narrator, J. (the author himself), George, Harris, and Montmorency, make plans to go up the river for ‘fresh air, exercise and quiet.’ They expect to work up a good appetite and to sleep well. I wondered why the title was Three Men In A Boat when four names were mentioned. Then I learned in Chapter 2 that Montmorency is a dog and every inch as loony as the three men.
That this getaway may turn out to be the worst of ideas began as soon the party sat down to pack for the trip. It was hilarious watching them throw together food, clothing, a kettle, and a whole barrage of paraphernalia they need. There was J. obsessing that he has forgotten to pack his toothbrush, with endless opening and closing of luggage to check and check again. I thought they will never get off for the trip. Finally, 'Home at last on the waters for two weeks!' I was really excited for them.
As one would expect, they bicker and fight over who will scull and tow the boat, cook the meals, and wash up, and where to camp for the night. I laughed reading about three men who cannot peel a potato to save their lives trying to cook an Irish stew. And to think they half contemplated adding to the garish concoction a water rat offered by Montmorency. Then there is a tantalizing can of pineapples they long to eat and they have no can opener. Oh, that episode was priceless.
Folks who have spent time boating down a weir will appreciate the demands of sculling and towing, and the misadventures that can happen. With the three men, everything that can go wrong goes diabolically wrong. I felt relief whenever their boat was safely anchored and they could finally settle down for supper.
Comedy aside, this is an interesting travelogue that carries some gorgeous description of scenery along the Thames. I googled the Knight Templars and the Bisham Abbey, once home to Anne of Cleves and Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth). I looked up pictures of a double-sculling skiff and even watched a Youtube video of how to work a lock on a river.
When the novel ended, I was sorry that the trip was over. But I suspect the three men and their dog were hugely relieved. What an unholy, madcap trinity plus one lovable dog!
Some quotes which I enjoyed:
A new day
‘It was a glorious morning, late spring or early summer, as you care to take it, when the dainty sheen of grass and leaf is blushing to a deeper green; and the year seems like a fair young maid, trembling with strange, wakening pulses on the brink of womanhood.’
Making tea
‘We put the kettle on to boil, up in the nose of the boat, … and pretended to take no notice of it… That is the only way to get a kettle to boil up the river. If it sees that you are waiting for it and are anxious, it will never even sing. You have to go away and begin your meal, as if you were not going to have any tea at all. You must not even look round at it. Then you will soon hear it sputtering away, mad to be made into tea.’
After a meal
‘How good one feels when one is full - how satisfied with ourselves and with the world! People who have tried it, tell me that a clear conscience makes you very happy and contented; but a full stomach does the business quite well, and is cheaper, and more easily obtained. One feels so forgiving and generous after a substantial and well-digested meal - so noble-minded, so kindly-hearted.’
Night
‘Night’s heart is full of pity for us: she cannot ease our aching; she takes our hand in hers, and the little world grows very small and very far away beneath us, and borne on her dark wings, we pass for a moment into a mightier Presence than her own, and in the wondrous light of that great Presence, all human life lies like a book before us, and we know that Pain and Sorrow are but the angels of God.’
Work
‘I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.’
June 15, 2017
It's a book of comical anecdotes strung together to compile the history of a 2 week vacation of 3 men who rent a boat and go rowing on the Thames. Oh, and their dog, Montmorency, goes along. It is one comic episode after another and so ridiculous that it could be titled 3 stooges in a boat and I wouldn't bat an eye. I did enjoy it and it was quite successful in it's day. I give it 3.5 stars, the extra half goes to the dog.
Read
September 6, 2018The story starts off with a man feeling out of sorts with his London life and leafing through a medical dictionary. Quickly he realises that he is suffering from every single aliment described - with the exception of washerwoman's elbow. He rushes off to see the doctor who listens to his story and prescribes him a simple holiday with a pork chop and two pints of beer daily for dinner.
So begins a classic of southern English humour. What strikes me how contemporary the basic set up still feels. An indefinable wrongness and dissatisfaction with daily life, the Doctor in this case acting not as a medical expert but as an embodiment of wisdom. The solution - being forced to appreciate the basic pleasures of life, which as the story unfolds are more than just pork chops and beer but more generally an awareness of everyday absurdity.
The journey of three men and a dog in a boat along the Thames prides a basic framework from which all kinds of comic set pieces can be hung. Rather than go into those struggles with a recalcitrant boat and the fishermen's delight in spinning sagas I'll tell a different story that I heard at a funeral some years ago. The speaker was remembering his deceased friend who we were laying to rest that day and how when they were all young they decided in the spirit of Three Men in a Boat to travel along the Thames (although admittedly without a dog). Anyhow after a particularly long and tiring day they came ashore by a pub, a very fancy and particular looking establishment to be sure, and one of them went in and asked the barman for three pints of beer.
With more than a slight sneer the barman said "we don't serve pints here".
To which the traveller in all innocence replied "oh, well, in that case can I have six halves please".
As it happens in case anybody thinks such stories are too remote from reality to be possibly true I'll add one of my own. With a colleague at the end of a working day we stopped at a public house, my colleague would invariably have a pint of a very commercial lager which I shall forbear to advertise, while I would apparently look for the meaning of life and so would happen on what ever suggested itself to me and so I asked for beer x ' oh ' quoth the young serving lad 'such beer is too terribly strong, we only serve it by halves', 'fine, I'll have two halves and a pint glass, then' to which request the lad complied. As perhaps you can imagine, the absurdities added most decidedly to the enjoyment of the drink.
So begins a classic of southern English humour. What strikes me how contemporary the basic set up still feels. An indefinable wrongness and dissatisfaction with daily life, the Doctor in this case acting not as a medical expert but as an embodiment of wisdom. The solution - being forced to appreciate the basic pleasures of life, which as the story unfolds are more than just pork chops and beer but more generally an awareness of everyday absurdity.
The journey of three men and a dog in a boat along the Thames prides a basic framework from which all kinds of comic set pieces can be hung. Rather than go into those struggles with a recalcitrant boat and the fishermen's delight in spinning sagas I'll tell a different story that I heard at a funeral some years ago. The speaker was remembering his deceased friend who we were laying to rest that day and how when they were all young they decided in the spirit of Three Men in a Boat to travel along the Thames (although admittedly without a dog). Anyhow after a particularly long and tiring day they came ashore by a pub, a very fancy and particular looking establishment to be sure, and one of them went in and asked the barman for three pints of beer.
With more than a slight sneer the barman said "we don't serve pints here".
To which the traveller in all innocence replied "oh, well, in that case can I have six halves please".
As it happens in case anybody thinks such stories are too remote from reality to be possibly true I'll add one of my own. With a colleague at the end of a working day we stopped at a public house, my colleague would invariably have a pint of a very commercial lager which I shall forbear to advertise, while I would apparently look for the meaning of life and so would happen on what ever suggested itself to me and so I asked for beer x ' oh ' quoth the young serving lad 'such beer is too terribly strong, we only serve it by halves', 'fine, I'll have two halves and a pint glass, then' to which request the lad complied. As perhaps you can imagine, the absurdities added most decidedly to the enjoyment of the drink.
September 25, 2019
Laugh-aloud hilarious! I felt as if I were tagging along, unobserved, on a boat trip with my brothers in the days of their youth (transposed back a century). The absurdities and ironies of the ordinary, things going wrong, anthropomorphism employed to great comic effect when boats and all their "cussed" paraphernalia seem to have minds of their own. Men showing off, embarrassments with girls, physical comedy, a bit of social commentary. The affectionate insults and jokes of three young buddies getting on each others' nerves.
Passages of purple prose about the scenery usually presaged a blunt come-down or outright disaster, as if the narrator were making fun of his own literary excess (and tendency to daydream and not pay attention to where he was steering) -- although sometimes those overdone descriptive passages seemed to be sweetly sincere expressions of awe or other emotion. But most of the prose is straightforward and modern. For an 1880s book this has aged amazingly well. The book might be even more enjoyable to someone who is actually familiar with England, the Thames River and her tributaries.
Passages of purple prose about the scenery usually presaged a blunt come-down or outright disaster, as if the narrator were making fun of his own literary excess (and tendency to daydream and not pay attention to where he was steering) -- although sometimes those overdone descriptive passages seemed to be sweetly sincere expressions of awe or other emotion. But most of the prose is straightforward and modern. For an 1880s book this has aged amazingly well. The book might be even more enjoyable to someone who is actually familiar with England, the Thames River and her tributaries.
October 16, 2023
(Image: Three Men in a Boat painting by Winslow Homer)
This short novel is about three dudes who decide to take what they assume will be a relaxing and rejuvenating boat trip up the Thames.
They are in need of a rest because it was oh-so-tough to be a rich person of leisure in England in the 19th century.
There are a few amusing incidents which elicited a smile and, less often, a chuckle. There are also boring parts and supposed-to-be-funny-but-are-not parts.
I most enjoyed, in the beginning, when Jerome (the main character's name is the same as the author's) self-diagnoses with the aid of a medical encyclopedia:
"The diagnosis seems in every case to correspond exactly with all the sensations I have ever felt.". (Ring a bell, anyone?)
Every single disease, with the exception of housemaid's knee, he realizes he's suffering from. (Dr. Google at your service!)
"There were no more diseases after zymosis so I concluded there was nothing else the matter with me."
It is a dry sort of humor, the kind I like most, and yet the mishaps that fall upon these men - or they bring upon themselves - just aren't that funny.
The guys take Montmorency, a fox terrier, along and I wish there'd been more about him. He was more interesting than those dolts whose company he found himself in.
Remember I said about the supposed-to-be-funny-but-are-not parts? Here's a for instance. Poor Montmorency gets injured by a tea kettle full of hot water.
That just makes me think of the stupid videos on 'America's Funniest Videos' that are anything but funny, just a bunch of people and animals getting hurt or scared.
So.... ho-hum and a diddle, diddle, dee.
March 31, 2018
I originally read this because I'm a big fan of Connie Willis and she went on and on about it, but when I actually read it, I was charmed for its own sake. :)
It's all so very droll.
Fish stories, laziness, incompetence, dishonesty, pathos and great verve stud these pages. It's an adventure for the ages! Of course, it's just three men in a boat, to say nothing of the dog.
Set in Victorian England, it captures the overblown hypochondriac feel of the age. :)
Well worth the read, and now I think I'm gonna hunt down takers for a first or re-read of Connie Willis' To Say Nothing of the Dog, which, I might add, might be a bit superior in every way. :)
It's all so very droll.
Fish stories, laziness, incompetence, dishonesty, pathos and great verve stud these pages. It's an adventure for the ages! Of course, it's just three men in a boat, to say nothing of the dog.
Set in Victorian England, it captures the overblown hypochondriac feel of the age. :)
Well worth the read, and now I think I'm gonna hunt down takers for a first or re-read of Connie Willis' To Say Nothing of the Dog, which, I might add, might be a bit superior in every way. :)
May 24, 2021
Written in 1899, this book could easily be contemporary, just change the scenery a bit and give these guys another mode of transportation. The three men in question, J, George and Harris, along with Montmorency the dog, decide to take a camping trip down the Thames (and when I include the dog in the decision making, it is not a stretch). The dynamics between the men is just what I would expect today of three young men on a camping excursion, particularly three men who are not overly adept at living an outdoor life. The humor is subtle and sometimes hilarious, and while there is little in the way of a plot, the book is sheer fun.
I can’t sit still and see another man slaving and working. I want to get up and superintend, and walk around with my hands in my pockets, and tell him what to do. It is my energetic nature. I can’t help it.
Seriously, I know this man! I might be related to him. Hell, I might be married to him.
The book is replete with this kind of sarcasm and anecdotes that show how little human nature has changed in 120 years. There is a maze experience that had me rolling, a struggle with a tin can of pineapple, and a fish tale that keeps growing. The boys fix a stew to which ”Montmorency, who had evinced great interest in the proceedings throughout, strolled away with an earnest and thoughtful air, reappearing, a few minutes afterwards, with a dead water-rat in his mouth, which he evidently wished to present as his contribution to the dinner…”
I’m not always good with comedy, but that got a laugh, even as my skin crawled thinking of the dead rat being put into the stew pot. Takes a certain kind of humor to really capture me. This did. Once again, I think I might have been born too late. I suspect I would have been at home in a previous century.
It takes three girls to tow always; two hold the rope, and the other one runs round and round, and giggles.
Maybe I would have been the giggler.
I can’t sit still and see another man slaving and working. I want to get up and superintend, and walk around with my hands in my pockets, and tell him what to do. It is my energetic nature. I can’t help it.
Seriously, I know this man! I might be related to him. Hell, I might be married to him.
The book is replete with this kind of sarcasm and anecdotes that show how little human nature has changed in 120 years. There is a maze experience that had me rolling, a struggle with a tin can of pineapple, and a fish tale that keeps growing. The boys fix a stew to which ”Montmorency, who had evinced great interest in the proceedings throughout, strolled away with an earnest and thoughtful air, reappearing, a few minutes afterwards, with a dead water-rat in his mouth, which he evidently wished to present as his contribution to the dinner…”
I’m not always good with comedy, but that got a laugh, even as my skin crawled thinking of the dead rat being put into the stew pot. Takes a certain kind of humor to really capture me. This did. Once again, I think I might have been born too late. I suspect I would have been at home in a previous century.
It takes three girls to tow always; two hold the rope, and the other one runs round and round, and giggles.
Maybe I would have been the giggler.
March 9, 2021
I know i don't take to plotless books with lackluster characters but Since this is a comedy i decided to give it a go. Somewhere between pointless frivolity and introspective human incite. classified as a comedic travelogue. man, Victorians loved travelogues!
As i said not much of a plot, In fact the title will suffice to tell you all you need to know so i'll keep this synopsis brief. Three men George, Harris and J. our narrator travel down the Thames river with J's dog Montmorency. Telling you what they saw and experienced with many amusing anecdotes along the way!
personal taste in Comedy can be very different. i found three men in a boat amusing sometimes and over-the-top slapstickish at others. kind of like watching Charlie Chaplin you think so this really made them LOL back in the day. More so then the humor i liked the historical tidbits interspersed throughout. since this is a travelogue. I can imagine how a knowledge of the area would improve your enjoyment. This seemed like a good snapshot of Victorian life!
I enjoyed this the more i listened to it. Narration you choose is important i did the one read by Frederick Davidson free on audible+ and was greatly disappointed. May spring for another version on audible later there're several to choose from! can see this being like Monty Python's the holy grail where at first i was not that impressed. Only to find myself quoting it and having watched it many more times years later!
As i said not much of a plot, In fact the title will suffice to tell you all you need to know so i'll keep this synopsis brief. Three men George, Harris and J. our narrator travel down the Thames river with J's dog Montmorency. Telling you what they saw and experienced with many amusing anecdotes along the way!
personal taste in Comedy can be very different. i found three men in a boat amusing sometimes and over-the-top slapstickish at others. kind of like watching Charlie Chaplin you think so this really made them LOL back in the day. More so then the humor i liked the historical tidbits interspersed throughout. since this is a travelogue. I can imagine how a knowledge of the area would improve your enjoyment. This seemed like a good snapshot of Victorian life!
I enjoyed this the more i listened to it. Narration you choose is important i did the one read by Frederick Davidson free on audible+ and was greatly disappointed. May spring for another version on audible later there're several to choose from! can see this being like Monty Python's the holy grail where at first i was not that impressed. Only to find myself quoting it and having watched it many more times years later!
July 10, 2011
This isn't really about three men in a boat, it is about Jerome being funny.
February 19, 2016
It looked like a breezy read, a good-natured gently comical novel. Certainly it is not at all hard to read but nevertheless, this book was a grind for me to get through. Humorous novels suffer a great disadvantage in that I tend to expect to find something to laugh at on each every page. This is quite a tall order and very hard for most books to accomplish. P.G. Wodehouse, Oscar Wilde, Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett often make me laugh with their fiction but generally I try to avoid comedy novels. I prefer humour to be a facet of the novel rather than the focus. Novels which are based on plots, thrills and characterization, including serious novels often make me laugh when the author slip in humorous scenes or dialogue at unexpected moments. This help to balance the overall tone of the book for me. Dickens is often funny somewhere in his long novels, even Victor Hugo's Les Mis has funny bits.
With Three Men in a Boat I am surprised to find that the humour totally fell flat for me. I find the humour in this book is very tame, very polite and centered on the silliness of the protagonists, particularly the narrator. The style of narration is also rather whimsical, going off on tangents with little supposedly comical vignettes every few paragraphs. Unfortunately, I did not find any of it funny. The characters are indeed suitably silly but there is no depth to them, they are all self-absorbed and I could not work up any interest in their antics. Tomfooleries like getting up late, waiting for a defiant kettle to boil, drinking horrible tea and whatnot leave me cold.
The entire enterprise seems completely pointless from beginning to end, and not a single chuckle escaped me. OK, it is a beloved classic which has been in print for more than a century so I have to respect it for that. If you find it funny I respect that too, but humour is very subjective and I subjected myself to this. Ah well, what you gonna do?
With Three Men in a Boat I am surprised to find that the humour totally fell flat for me. I find the humour in this book is very tame, very polite and centered on the silliness of the protagonists, particularly the narrator. The style of narration is also rather whimsical, going off on tangents with little supposedly comical vignettes every few paragraphs. Unfortunately, I did not find any of it funny. The characters are indeed suitably silly but there is no depth to them, they are all self-absorbed and I could not work up any interest in their antics. Tomfooleries like getting up late, waiting for a defiant kettle to boil, drinking horrible tea and whatnot leave me cold.
The entire enterprise seems completely pointless from beginning to end, and not a single chuckle escaped me. OK, it is a beloved classic which has been in print for more than a century so I have to respect it for that. If you find it funny I respect that too, but humour is very subjective and I subjected myself to this. Ah well, what you gonna do?
November 4, 2020
Jeszcze nigdy nie czytałam równie specyficznej książki, ale podobała mi się!
April 1, 2022
Three Men in a Boat is a completely and absolutely delightful waste of time. I must have bookmarked at least twenty hilarious passages to go back and read again for a last chuckle before returning to the library (I may subject you to some of them if the mood hits me before I wind this up). I listened and then read so I could enjoy the nonsense dialogue (both verbal and literary) a second time. Published in 1889 this book is in the Public Domain and available for free download from the Gutenberg Project and probably elsewhere. It is also available on Kindle Unlimited. There are several audio versions, probably all good, but I chose the narration by Hugh Laurie and the delivery was perfect!
The (very lean) plot: Three idle young men (Jerome, George, and Harrison), who seemingly have nothing better to do with their time than to ramble reflectively for hours regarding their hypochondriasis ailments and on every other moronic thought that pops into their heads, decided that although a sea voyage might benefit their health. They did not have the time to do so - but, they mused, wouldn’t it be lovely to book a boat and take a fortnight boat-ride holiday of canals and locks on the river Thames? Although this does sound sublime, these three young swells and their dog Montmorency, are not taking a barge cruise but rather more like a camping trip along the Thames and since they are adept at absolutely nothing but sloth they are in for surprising adventures (surprising to them but not to the reader). The plot here is nothing more than a vehicle for the comical ruminations of Jerome.
Before setting out, the three of them carefully planned – down to the last detail – what they needed to prepare for their trip. If this was today, it would probably read like one of my camping trip lists starting with the essentials: electronics and chargers, blow-up mattress and snuggly bedclothes, wet-wipes, tissues, toilet paper, Tupperware laden food supply, plastic dinner service (shame on me), wine, flashlights, and at least half a dozen family card games. But since it was 1889 the prep and carriage was a lot more cumbersome and there are a few hilarious descriptions of their packing.
Of course, they forgot to pack a can opener and there is also a funny passage describing their attempts to get at the pineapple inside a tin. (Okay, I can't resist, i'm still chuckling so I'm adding the scene below:)
They had a tarp cover of sorts and frame to protect them from the rain (and there was plenty of it)…their struggle to construct the covering had me giggling (too bad they couldn’t hop over to the convenience store at the gas station near my house – they could have bought a tent that pops open to a three room villa for $20)!
On their sightseeing tour they were lost in a maze for a few hours with about twenty other people who were lost inside including the staff member who came in to help them find their way out.
One night, after mooring the boat and heading into the town for a pub, on the way back, it was raining so hard they decided to spend the night in town but there were no rooms to be let. They considered punching a policeman but then they mused that the policemen might just punch them back instead of hauling them in to spend the night in jail.
By the end of he story Jerome was pooped…he felt he had been put upon and that the others should share in the work (his rationale):
To be honest, I had never heard of Jerome K. Jerome, before reading a review of this book by GR Friend Peter. I was sure it must be a pen-name for Oscar Wilde, because it was Wilde who popped into my head as soon as the humorous rambling began. Jerome K. Jerome was in fact a writer of the same period and may have traveled the same literary circles, but they do not appear to have been friends. I read a little blurb on the internet suggesting that it might even have been Jerome who outed Wilde in one of the former’s publications, but the latter was hardly discreet.
The (very lean) plot: Three idle young men (Jerome, George, and Harrison), who seemingly have nothing better to do with their time than to ramble reflectively for hours regarding their hypochondriasis ailments and on every other moronic thought that pops into their heads, decided that although a sea voyage might benefit their health. They did not have the time to do so - but, they mused, wouldn’t it be lovely to book a boat and take a fortnight boat-ride holiday of canals and locks on the river Thames? Although this does sound sublime, these three young swells and their dog Montmorency, are not taking a barge cruise but rather more like a camping trip along the Thames and since they are adept at absolutely nothing but sloth they are in for surprising adventures (surprising to them but not to the reader). The plot here is nothing more than a vehicle for the comical ruminations of Jerome.
Before setting out, the three of them carefully planned – down to the last detail – what they needed to prepare for their trip. If this was today, it would probably read like one of my camping trip lists starting with the essentials: electronics and chargers, blow-up mattress and snuggly bedclothes, wet-wipes, tissues, toilet paper, Tupperware laden food supply, plastic dinner service (shame on me), wine, flashlights, and at least half a dozen family card games. But since it was 1889 the prep and carriage was a lot more cumbersome and there are a few hilarious descriptions of their packing.
“…chaos reigned… and then there remained the hampers to do. They began in a light-hearted spirit, and I looked at the piles of plates and cups, and kettles, and bottles and jars, and pies, and stoves, and cakes, and tomatoes, &c., and felt that the thing would soon become exciting.It did. They started with breaking a cup. That was the first thing they did. They did that just to show you what they could do, and to get you interested. Then Harris packed the strawberry jam on top of a tomato and squashed it, and they had to pick out the tomato with a teaspoon. And then it was George’s turn, and he trod on the butter…and they stepped on things, and put things behind them, and then couldn’t find them when they wanted them; and they packed the pies at the bottom, and put heavy things on top, and smashed the pies in. They upset salt over everything, and as for the butter! I never saw two men do more with one-and-twopence worth of butter in my whole life than they did (they obviously never watched Last Tango in Paris). After George had got it off his slipper, they tried to put it in the kettle. It wouldn’t go in, and what was in wouldn’t come out. They did scrape it out at last, and put it down on a chair, and Harris sat on it, and it stuck to him, and they went looking for it all over the room.”
Of course, they forgot to pack a can opener and there is also a funny passage describing their attempts to get at the pineapple inside a tin. (Okay, I can't resist, i'm still chuckling so I'm adding the scene below:)
"It cast a gloom over the boat, there being no mustard. We ate our beef in silence. Existence seemed hollow and uninteresting…. George drew out a tin of pine-apple from the bottom of the hamper, and rolled it into the middle of the boat, we felt that life was worth living after all…Then we looked for the knife to open the tin with. We turned out everything in the hamper. We turned out the bags. We pulled up the boards at the bottom of the boat. We took everything out on to the bank and shook it. There was no tin-opener to be found...Then Harris tried to open the tin with a pocket-knife, and broke the knife and cut himself badly; and George tried a pair of scissors, and the scissors flew up, and nearly put his eye out. While they were dressing their wounds, I tried to make a hole in the thing with the spiky end of the hitcher, and the hitcher slipped and jerked me out between the boat and the bank into two feet of muddy water, and the tin rolled over, uninjured, and broke a teacup….Harris went up into a field and got a big sharp stone, and I went back into the boat and brought out the mast, and George held the tin and Harris held the sharp end of his stone against the top of it…It was George’s straw hat that saved his life that day…Harris got off with merely a flesh wound…We beat it out flat; we beat it back square; we battered it into every form known to geometry—but we could not make a hole in it. Then George went at it, and knocked it into a shape, so strange, so weird, so unearthly in its wild hideousness, that he got frightened and threw away the mast. Then we all three sat round it on the grass and looked at it."
They had a tarp cover of sorts and frame to protect them from the rain (and there was plenty of it)…their struggle to construct the covering had me giggling (too bad they couldn’t hop over to the convenience store at the gas station near my house – they could have bought a tent that pops open to a three room villa for $20)!
On their sightseeing tour they were lost in a maze for a few hours with about twenty other people who were lost inside including the staff member who came in to help them find their way out.
One night, after mooring the boat and heading into the town for a pub, on the way back, it was raining so hard they decided to spend the night in town but there were no rooms to be let. They considered punching a policeman but then they mused that the policemen might just punch them back instead of hauling them in to spend the night in jail.
By the end of he story Jerome was pooped…he felt he had been put upon and that the others should share in the work (his rationale):
“I said I thought Harris would have been showing a more proper spirit if he had suggested that he and George should work, and let me rest a bit. It seemed to me that I was doing more than my fair share of the work on this trip, and I was beginning to feel strongly on the subject. It always does seem to me that I am doing more work than I should do. It is not that I object to the work, mind you; I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours. I love to keep it by me: the idea of getting rid of it nearly breaks my heart. You cannot give me too much work; to accumulate work has almost become a passion with me: my study is so full of it now, that there is hardly an inch of room for anymore. I shall have to throw out a wing soon. And I am careful of my work, too. Why, some of the work that I have by me now has been in my possession for years and years, and there isn’t a finger-mark on it. I take a great pride in my work; I take it down now and then and dust it. No man keeps his work in a better state of preservation than I do….”
To be honest, I had never heard of Jerome K. Jerome, before reading a review of this book by GR Friend Peter. I was sure it must be a pen-name for Oscar Wilde, because it was Wilde who popped into my head as soon as the humorous rambling began. Jerome K. Jerome was in fact a writer of the same period and may have traveled the same literary circles, but they do not appear to have been friends. I read a little blurb on the internet suggesting that it might even have been Jerome who outed Wilde in one of the former’s publications, but the latter was hardly discreet.
April 8, 2009
Utterly delightful from beginning to end; had me in stitches more than once. I loved the digressions, the endless tales about friends and friends-of-friends; the charming diagrams; the sudden swoops into romantic (and Romantic) flights of fancy. In my mind, all three characters spoke like Hugh Laurie as Bertie Wooster (with similar sensibility; that is to say, none at all).
I can't reproduce it all here, but one of my favorite scenes was that in which the narrator describes his loathing for steam launches -- hilarious! -- followed by the scene in which they are towed by a steam launch and the narrator rails against the "wretched small boats that are continually getting in the way of our launch."
And the packing scene! "I never saw two men do more with one-and-twopence worth of butter in my whole life than they did."
And the chapter headings! Loved.
I am now going to go back and re-read that scene in To Say Nothing of the Dog in which they run into the hapless boaters.
Folded corners:
I can't reproduce it all here, but one of my favorite scenes was that in which the narrator describes his loathing for steam launches -- hilarious! -- followed by the scene in which they are towed by a steam launch and the narrator rails against the "wretched small boats that are continually getting in the way of our launch."
And the packing scene! "I never saw two men do more with one-and-twopence worth of butter in my whole life than they did."
And the chapter headings! Loved.
I am now going to go back and re-read that scene in To Say Nothing of the Dog in which they run into the hapless boaters.
Folded corners:
...down he would slide on to the piano, a really fine musical effect being produced by the suddenness with which his head and body struck all the notes at the same time.
And Aunt Maria would say that she would not allow the children to stand round and hear such language.
The remaining four passengers sat on for a while, until a solemn-looking man in the corner, who, from his dress and general appearance, seemed to belong to the undertaker class, said {the smell of the cheese} put him in mind of a dead baby; and the other three passengers tried to get out of the door at the same time, and hurt themselves.
They started by breaking a cup. That was the first thing they did. They did that just to show you what they could do, and to get you interested.
Montmorency was in it all, of course. Montmorency's ambition in life, is to get in the way and be sworn at. If he can squirm in anywhere where he particularly is not wanted, and be a perfect nuisance, and make people mad, and have things thrown at his head, then he feels his day has not been wasted.
She was nuts on public houses, was England's Virgin Queen. There's scarcely a pub of any attractions within ten miles of London that she does not seem to have looked in at, or stopped at, or slept at, some time or another.
...a gentleman in shirt sleeves and a short pipe came along, and wanted to know if we knew that we were trespassing. We said we hadn't given the matter sufficient consideration as yet to enable us to arrive at a definite conclusion on that point, but that, if he assured us on his word as a gentleman that we were trespassing, we would, without further hesitation, believe it.
You get near the kettle, so that it can overhear you, and then you shout out, "I don't want any tea; do you, George?" to which George shouts back, "Oh, no, I don't like tea; we'll have lemonade instead--tea's so indigestible." Upon which the kettle boils over, and puts the stove out.
When I meet a cat, I say, "Poor Pussy!" and stoop down and tickle the side of its head; and the cat sticks up its tail in a rigid, cast-iron manner, arches its back, and wipes its nose up against my trousers; and all is gentleness and peace. When Montmorency meets a cat, the whole street knows about it; and there is enough bad language wasted in ten seconds to last an ordinary respectable man all his life, with care.
Goring is not nearly so pretty a little spot to stop... but it is passing fair enough in its way, and is nearer the railway in case you want to slip off without paying your bill.
February 5, 2023
It turns out that I only identify as a woman in 2023 and that my true self is a late Victorian gentleman with a ropey sense of humour. Who knew? Those that know me probably had an inkling when the weak puns in The Diary of a Nobody had me crying with laughter and still chuckling to myself a longer-than-is-seemly while later.
The book is about so many things that are important to me, a journey along the Thames (I am a born and enamoured Londoner), friendship, dogs and the need to sometimes just escape from the humdrum of life. Fortunately for me it is not a travelogue, despite there being some beautiful descriptions of the countryside and villages they pass through and some historical background to said places it is more about the joy and niggles that come with spending a holiday with your best friends.
As with DoaN, I laughed aloud often, much to the annoyance of those unfortunate enough to be around me, as I saw myself or people I know in so many of the situations they describe. (Like Harris I cannot sing, forget the words or more commonly replace the words with what I think they are,
”You don’t expect a man to never remember more than the first three lines of the first verse, and to keep repeating these until it is time to begin the chorus. You don’t expect a man to break off in the middle of a line, and snigger, and say, it’s very funny, but he’s blest if he can think of the rest of it…”
We may have over 100 years of technological advance but Jerome’s description of a man setting out to hang a picture which turns into an epic involving every family member hunting for the tools, minor injuries, lost glasses until the picture is hung, wonkily, on a wall several hours later is a pretty accurate account of any job that has been undertaken either by my father when I was a child or in my current home,
Then we had to find the rule and the string again, and a new hole was made; and, about midnight, the picture would be up – very crooked and insecure, the wall for yards round looking as if it had been smoothed down with a rake, and everybody dead beat and wretched- except Uncle Podger.”
In other curiously modern episodes we see the British Library substituted for Google search in helping our narrator discover that he is suffering from every ailment bar Housemaid’s Knee while looking up a treatment for hayferver,
”I sat for a while frozen with horror; and then, in the listlessness of despair, I again turned over the pages. I came to typhoid fever – read the symptoms- discovered that I had typhoid fever, must have had it for months without knowing it – wondered what else I had got; turned up St Vitus’s Dance – found, as I suspected, that I had that too…”
that Reading has always been a shithole,
“Even Reading, though it does its best to spoil and sully and make hideous as much of the river as it can reach, is good-natured enough to keep its ugly face a good deal out of sight.”
and that the right to roam and antagonistic landowners are always a fraught coupling,
“Where it is really the owners that are to blame, they ought to be shown up. The selfishness of the riparian proprietor grows with every year. If these men had their way they would close the river Thames altogether. They actually do this along the minor tributary streams and in the backwaters. They drive posts into the bed of the stream, and draw chains across from bank to bank, and nail huge notice-boards on every tree.”
I adored this book from start to finish as is evident from the amount of quotes I have included (and my phone is full of many more that I couldn’t include without transcribing the whole book). It’s a wonderful testament to friendship, to the Thames and to the foibles of human nature remaining constant despite the changing times. A true joy to read and I urge everyone to do so.
The book is about so many things that are important to me, a journey along the Thames (I am a born and enamoured Londoner), friendship, dogs and the need to sometimes just escape from the humdrum of life. Fortunately for me it is not a travelogue, despite there being some beautiful descriptions of the countryside and villages they pass through and some historical background to said places it is more about the joy and niggles that come with spending a holiday with your best friends.
As with DoaN, I laughed aloud often, much to the annoyance of those unfortunate enough to be around me, as I saw myself or people I know in so many of the situations they describe. (Like Harris I cannot sing, forget the words or more commonly replace the words with what I think they are,
”You don’t expect a man to never remember more than the first three lines of the first verse, and to keep repeating these until it is time to begin the chorus. You don’t expect a man to break off in the middle of a line, and snigger, and say, it’s very funny, but he’s blest if he can think of the rest of it…”
We may have over 100 years of technological advance but Jerome’s description of a man setting out to hang a picture which turns into an epic involving every family member hunting for the tools, minor injuries, lost glasses until the picture is hung, wonkily, on a wall several hours later is a pretty accurate account of any job that has been undertaken either by my father when I was a child or in my current home,
Then we had to find the rule and the string again, and a new hole was made; and, about midnight, the picture would be up – very crooked and insecure, the wall for yards round looking as if it had been smoothed down with a rake, and everybody dead beat and wretched- except Uncle Podger.”
In other curiously modern episodes we see the British Library substituted for Google search in helping our narrator discover that he is suffering from every ailment bar Housemaid’s Knee while looking up a treatment for hayferver,
”I sat for a while frozen with horror; and then, in the listlessness of despair, I again turned over the pages. I came to typhoid fever – read the symptoms- discovered that I had typhoid fever, must have had it for months without knowing it – wondered what else I had got; turned up St Vitus’s Dance – found, as I suspected, that I had that too…”
that Reading has always been a shithole,
“Even Reading, though it does its best to spoil and sully and make hideous as much of the river as it can reach, is good-natured enough to keep its ugly face a good deal out of sight.”
and that the right to roam and antagonistic landowners are always a fraught coupling,
“Where it is really the owners that are to blame, they ought to be shown up. The selfishness of the riparian proprietor grows with every year. If these men had their way they would close the river Thames altogether. They actually do this along the minor tributary streams and in the backwaters. They drive posts into the bed of the stream, and draw chains across from bank to bank, and nail huge notice-boards on every tree.”
I adored this book from start to finish as is evident from the amount of quotes I have included (and my phone is full of many more that I couldn’t include without transcribing the whole book). It’s a wonderful testament to friendship, to the Thames and to the foibles of human nature remaining constant despite the changing times. A true joy to read and I urge everyone to do so.
June 21, 2021
Enjoyed this one so much!!!
Some fun, some tears, some poetry and some second hand embarrassment.
The first chapter made me burst out laughing so hard. If you are in the medical line and know similar people, you will know what I mean.
And I knew I won't recover from it unless I read the entire book!
The characters are so damn funny.
It's the monologues that's like no book that would come out would ever achieve.
The writing! It's the writing that made it so fun and fast paced to read.
I don't know what I have been doing all this time staring at the paperback for more than 3 years. We have been staring at each other a lot this entire time. And now I know why!
It's the story of three adult men who are tired, overworked and looking for some time off together.
The cheese (mis) adventure, the weather forecast monologue, the train platform dilemma, the new places (oh!), the bickering over their daily routines, the nerd kid story, the characters getting lost and directionless now and then, Harris' comic songs, the boat struggles, the tea and meal monologues, George overthinking all the time, the Henry VIIIth thing, the mustard necessity, the ghost story, dialogues between the cat and Montmorency, when Harris and the pie disappear, the potato peeling scene, the swan battle, the punting, a dead body (?), the big trout fishing story, that photographer, that clever boy and the end. Enjoy!
One of the characters is a hypochondriac. Overdiagnosing himself with all the information on diseases. (I don't want to know what would happen if he had internet access.)
Love the lyrical writing in between. Otherwise it's just the chaotic adult characters going bonkers and being dramatic for (literally) EVERYTHING.
The only way to enjoy this book is not to think too much while reading it. You will be able to enjoy it a lot more that way!
The book has some pretty serious parts which I would want you to take your time. Some parts are heavy and most parts are satirical. But well, take your time while reading this book. You will enjoy their adventure more.
Some fun, some tears, some poetry and some second hand embarrassment.
The first chapter made me burst out laughing so hard. If you are in the medical line and know similar people, you will know what I mean.
And I knew I won't recover from it unless I read the entire book!
The characters are so damn funny.
It's the monologues that's like no book that would come out would ever achieve.
The writing! It's the writing that made it so fun and fast paced to read.
I don't know what I have been doing all this time staring at the paperback for more than 3 years. We have been staring at each other a lot this entire time. And now I know why!
It's the story of three adult men who are tired, overworked and looking for some time off together.
The cheese (mis) adventure, the weather forecast monologue, the train platform dilemma, the new places (oh!), the bickering over their daily routines, the nerd kid story, the characters getting lost and directionless now and then, Harris' comic songs, the boat struggles, the tea and meal monologues, George overthinking all the time, the Henry VIIIth thing, the mustard necessity, the ghost story, dialogues between the cat and Montmorency, when Harris and the pie disappear, the potato peeling scene, the swan battle, the punting, a dead body (?), the big trout fishing story, that photographer, that clever boy and the end. Enjoy!
One of the characters is a hypochondriac. Overdiagnosing himself with all the information on diseases. (I don't want to know what would happen if he had internet access.)
Love the lyrical writing in between. Otherwise it's just the chaotic adult characters going bonkers and being dramatic for (literally) EVERYTHING.
The only way to enjoy this book is not to think too much while reading it. You will be able to enjoy it a lot more that way!
The book has some pretty serious parts which I would want you to take your time. Some parts are heavy and most parts are satirical. But well, take your time while reading this book. You will enjoy their adventure more.
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