Three Men in a Boat: ...to say nothing of the dog
By Jerome K. Jerome and David Mann
4/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
Jerome K. Jerome
Jerome Klapka Jerome was born in 1859 and was brought up in London. He started work as a railway clerk at fourteen, and later was employed as a schoolmaster, actor and journalist. He published two volumes of comic essays and in 1889 Three Men in a Boat. This was an instant success. His new-found wealth enabled him to become one of the founders of The Idler, a humorous magazine which published pieces by W W Jacobs, Bret Harte, Mark Twain and others. In 1900 he wrote a sequel, Three Men on the Bummel, which follows the adventures of the three protagonists on a walking tour through Germany. Jerome married in 1888 and had a daughter. He served as an ambulance driver on the Western Front during the First World War and died in 1927.
Read more from Jerome K. Jerome
Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Three Men in a Boat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThree Men in a Boat and Three Men on the Bummel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Three Men in a Boat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSketches in Lavender, Blue and Green Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe New Utopia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Three Men on the Bummel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Big Book of Christmas Mysteries: What the Shepherd Saw, The Mystery of Room Five, The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle... Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMy Life and Times Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Second Thoughts of an Idle Fellow (Barnes & Noble Digital Library) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Told After Supper Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNovel Notes (Barnes & Noble Digital Library) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Three Men in a Boat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPaul Kelver: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTold After Supper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All Roads Lead to Calvary Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Dead Rise Again on Christmas Eve: 40 Occult & Supernatural Thrillers, Horror Classics & Macabre Mysteries Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Three Men in a Boat
Related ebooks
The Years Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThree Men in a Boat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Second Life of Sally Mottram Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAnne of Green Gables Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSleepily Ever After: Bedtime Stories for Grown Ups Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Other House by Henry James (Illustrated) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGulliver's travels Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Doldrums and the Helmsley Curse Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Midnight Feasts: Tasty poems chosen by A.F. Harrold Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHome Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Time Machine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Teeth of the Tiger Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5McClure's Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe World and Everything in It Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMerde at the Paris Olympics: Going for Pétanque Gold Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLiving Alone Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5On Our Selection Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPiccadilly Jim Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Thirty-Nine Steps Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Last of the Line Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Moonfleet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Under the Deodars Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Riddle of the Sands (Golden Deer Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Modern Mephistopheles Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Man of Means Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWe of the Never Never Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Man in the Brown Suit Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe lost World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAlice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass: And What Alice Found There Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Classics For You
The Master & Margarita Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Flowers for Algernon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Confederacy of Dunces Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Learn French! Apprends l'Anglais! THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY: In French and English Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Little Women (Seasons Edition -- Winter) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silmarillion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fellowship Of The Ring: Being the First Part of The Lord of the Rings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wuthering Heights (with an Introduction by Mary Augusta Ward) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Old Man and the Sea: The Hemingway Library Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Farewell to Arms Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Count of Monte-Cristo English and French Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad: The Fitzgerald Translation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5East of Eden Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Good Man Is Hard To Find And Other Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sense and Sensibility (Centaur Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Jungle: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Odyssey: (The Stephen Mitchell Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Republic by Plato Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Things They Carried Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Persuasion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Animal Farm: A Fairy Story Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Warrior of the Light: A Manual Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Titus Groan Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As I Lay Dying Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bell Jar: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ulysses: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Three Men in a Boat
1,805 ratings128 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5There are loads of reviews on this work, so this is only to say, I loved this book. It is one I will be seeking in hardcover so that I may read it again. I had the ebook version, and although the story was still wonderful, the illustrations were tiny. I need to hold this book, flip the pages back and forth, reread passages, underline some of them and make notes in the margins. I want to have a relationship with it and I can't do that with an ebook. There are not many books I feel that way about.This one had me laughing out-loud frequently. Not hysterical laughing, but amused laughing. Much of it felt modern, but certain passages made the reader aware of the times the book was written in. I took my time reading this, because I wanted to appreciate it. It is farce, comedy, poetic, philosophical, and retrospective. Good, clean fun. The only thing which could make it better for me, is if I had been on a boating trip on the Thames, but the author describes it in such a way, that I feel I have been.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The classic tale of three young men who decide to take a respite from their lives and spend two weeks rowing up the river Thames.I knew this was a comic novel but I wasn't quite prepared for just how often this book would have me laughing out loud. The many asides our narrator gives on his previous boating experiences, the locales that surround him, and the adventures that he and his two friends as well as his dog get up to had me giggling loudly both at home and in public. Probably best read if you've had some other experience with Victorian literature but highly recommended if you haven't picked this one up already.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) recounts a two-week boating holiday on the Thames from Kingston to Oxford and back again. The story focuses on George, Harris, Jerome, and Jerome’s dog, Montmorency, as they plan the trip and recount past stories in the course of their adventures. Jerome humorously muses on the nature of cheese, the habit of visiting tombs in picturesque villages, historical Thames islands like Magna Charta Island, their visitors such as Kings John and Henry VIII, the nature of Victorian-era flirting, the relationships of dogs, the methods of rowing, fish stories, and more. Though some of the situations Jerome describes are uniquely nineteenth-century, the wit of his writing will entertain readers over a hundred years later. This Folio Society edition reprints the original 1889 text with illustrations from Paul Cox that capture the humor of Jerome’s text.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Mild fun up the Thames. This book was originally commissioned as a travelogue but it does seem to have hung on remarkably well. It takes about two hours to read, but it is best taken in small bites. It was originally copyright in 1889.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Timeless humor. Very easy to read.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This is a gentle, fitfully humorous book about three men and a dog taking a boat trip up the Thames from London (and back). It is full of humorous digressions, a couple of which will make you chuckle a bit. Mostly, however, these episodes just serve to show that human nature hasn't changed since 1889 when this was written. There are also poetic passages extolling the landscape as well as factual passages about particular places. I found myself turning to the Internet again and again to look things up--and it doesn't appear much has changed. You could, in fact, still use this as a travel guide for such a journey. And despite the mishaps portrayed, you'll want to go.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Light, amusing and occasionally brilliantly written (I'm a sucker for alliteration). Full of digressions, each of which is just about precisely the right length. > I do think that, of all the silly, irritating tomfoolishness by which we are plagued, this “weather-forecast” fraud is about the most aggravating. It “forecasts” precisely what happened yesterday or a the day before, and precisely the opposite of what is going to happen today. … But who wants to be foretold the weather? It is bad enough when it comes, without our having the misery of knowing about it beforehand.> We had just commenced the third course—the bread and jam—when a gentleman in shirtsleeves 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. He gave us the required assurance, and we thanked him, but he still hung about, and seemed to be dissatisfied, so we asked him if there was anything further that we could do for him; and Harris, who is of a chummy disposition, offered him a bit of bread and jam.…> 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 any more. 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 fingermark on it.> 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.> But the river—chill and weary, with the ceaseless raindrops falling on its brown and sluggish waters, with a 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.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Light funny and entertaining as well as giving you a history lesson as J and friends travel up the thames. I now want to get a fox terrier :-)
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5What a complete little gem this is! A quick read, only 100 pages, but I laughed from beginning to end. I was needing something funny to read, and this quickie really worked. Recommended!
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5What a complete little gem this is! A quick read, only 100 pages, but I laughed from beginning to end. I was needing something funny to read, and this quickie really worked. Recommended!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/54.5 stars? It would be 5, but the occasional serious sections tossed in here and there - and the abrupt change of direction at the end - knocked it down a bit for me. One of the funniest books I've read in a long time, though. Highly recommended!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Enduringly hilarious.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Fantastic. Hysterical. Sly. Beautiful. Historical. Sarcastic. Witty. Read it.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Entertaining comedy.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hilarious. Overripe comedy in the style of Mark Twain. I subtract one star only for the excruciatingly long passages which mimic and mock lyrical writing of the 19th century; it's expertly done, and I'm sure it killed at the time, but today it's a bit much.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Written in the late 19th century, Three Men is the comic fictionalised tale of the author's boating journey along the Thames. He travels with 2 friends and Montmorency, a rather feisty terrier. The three talk, muse, bicker, reminisce, and occasionally even get some boating in. There are a couple awkward spots where something more serious happens - awkward in that they don't fit with the generally lighter tone of the book. That, though, is offset by a wealth of humorous observations and incidents, tall tales, mishaps, and various encounters both on water and on land. The book, like the trip described, meanders pleasantly along, not always going somewhere directly, not always getting where it perhaps planned to be, but in the end leaving the journeyer happy they went along for the ride.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I read that Jerome K. Jerome didn't intend Three Men In A Boat to be a humorous tale, but his editor took out all the serious parts. I don't know how happy Jerome was about that, but I have to say I'm quite pleased.Three Men In A Boat is one of the funniest books I've ever read. It's so clever and so witty and so -fun-! I will have to read it about ten million more times so I can quote every single line when the occasion arrises.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I have long had this book sitting on my shelf. Actually, it's been sitting on the "recommended for a laugh" shelf for years now. And I scraped a price tag off of it that tells me I bought it way back in 2001. So for an appallingly long time, I haven't touched a book that came highly recommended, about which I occasionally hear very positive things even from people not inclined to read a whole lot. I don't know whether I was afraid it wouldn't live up to everything I'd heard or what exactly had slowed me down from reading it, but I have to say to anyone else out there with Jerome K. Jerome's Three Men in a Boat sitting neglected on a shelf: take it down and settle in to a very enjoyable read, one that will make you smile and chuckle and even break out into a full fledged laugh that will make others in public look at you strangely and move their seats as far from you as possible.Written in 1889, this novel is an hilarious travel narrative peppered with small amounts of English history. Jerome, two of his equally hypochondriac friends, and Montmorency, a fox terrier, decide to scull up the river Thames for a fortnight. They are looking for a bit of a rest from their apparently strenuous lives, lives the reader soon discovers are mostly indolent and non-taxing in the extreme. The fresh air will certainly cure them of their imagined ills. And so they head off on their boating holiday. As they row upriver, Jerome takes the opportunity to tell brief bits of important (and sometimes not so important) history that occurred in the towns on the banks of the river. But in and amongst these serious pieces of information, he also chronicles the misadventures of their inept, bumbling, and lackadaisical trio using the sort of ascerbic and dry wit that is a hallmark of a certain kind of British humor. From J., George, and Harris's slapstick occurrences on this present trip to flashbacks of previous trips and completely tangential but hysterically funny stories (I defy you to read about the stinky cheese without worrying you're going to wet your pants laughing), the tale is entertaining and, despite its age, completely accessible. The three main characters are irritable and crotchety, averse to hard work, goofy, and yet incredibly adroit at telling appealing and laugh-inducing tall tales. Their teasing and good natured interactions with each other, despite all the bollocksing up they do is delightful and the humor is ultimately self-effacing, gentle, and wonderful. The book, designed to be a travelogue rather than a plot-driven read, is pleasant, funny, and marvelous and now that I know what a small gem I have on my shelf, I fully intend to take it down and enjoy it again and again.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I loved Jerome's sense of humor. I also loved the "once-upon-a-timeyfied" quality. Overall though Montmorency was my most very favorite part of this book. I could have used a little more of him.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5(To say nothing of the dog.) This 1889 story is timeless, a true classic. While some classics, while quite deserving of the label and wonderful literature, can be a bit serious about themselves. This one is absolutely hilarious.The characters are quick to see the flaws in others while not seeing the same flaws in themselves, not unusual but rarely described as humorously. They are simply dolts. Even the hapless dog, along for the ride, has his moments.There is one very offensive and unnecessary use of the n-word, but given the time when this was written, that is not too surprising.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hilarious, and well-written in a tongue-in-cheek way. Laughed out loud several times.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Three Men in a Boat (Xist Classics) Story of three men and how they plan to camp out while traveling around in a boat.So many things can go wrong and so do and how they deal with it.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Three men and their dog row a boat from Kingston to Oxford. This book was a huge seller when published in 1889. Initially devised as a means of highlighting various historical sites and places of interest along that stretch of river but it developed into more of a comedy. In some ways, sometimes, the humour is pretty clever but it generally failed to hit the mark with me but no doubt comedy tastes have changed considerably over the past 100 plus years. I preferred the limited historical details but these were islands in a sea of long digressions that gave vehicle to the authors humour. Some might still appreciate the funny stuff here but it wasn't for me.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5An obviously good writer with a good sense of humour. But the views feel a little dated and the jokes and stories become a little wearing. The structure at times feels too formulaic. Despite this, it is an interesting look at leisure a century ago, and how things are still very much the same, but also different. It is only 190 pages long, but it still seemed to take me an inordinately long time to finish.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Very amusing. Somehow, I had Hugh Laurie as Bertie Wooster narrating as I read.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ostensibly a travelogue for river travel on the Thames written in 1889. If all travelogues were written like this, I swear I'd read them all!A boat holiday memoir by Jerome, he ranges from laugh-out-loud funny (as when he describes his & his buddies' rampant hypochondria and thus their need for a holiday) to some lovely poetic prose as he describes the beauty & serenity of the river to downright educational (but only in the brief, non-painful, sometimes funny but usually interesting history of the sites one will pass along the river). I totally adored Jerome's dry wit and humorous tongue-in-cheek delivery throughout. I'm ready to take the same river trip myself with his book in hand. I've just downloaded the sequel, Three Men on the Bummel, and am torn between reading it immediately or delaying so to allow anticipation to build thus savoring it the more!
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The problem was that I started this book with high hopes.. so i was actually prepared for a 'laugh out loud' moments but I kept waiting and it never came, there was no great story or plot and even the sub-stories annoyed me at times! But..having said that i still enjoyed this book, there were many funny moments which made me giggle!
This book was all about amusing moments related to human nature, his way of thinking and doing which is conveyed in a simple humors way, with pure language which according to me was the best part of this book. May be if I had read this book 10 years before i would have enjoyed more I guess! - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wryly humorous and proof that nothing at all has changed in human nature in the last hundred years or so.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Jerome takes us on a quaint little adventure through the British countryside. This book is lovely as it describes tongue-in-cheek the sites of the Thames as well as the historical trivia of various villages. From a modern perspective, it also gives interesting insight on the mores and habits of the day (most specifically young men!).Humour is always tricky: what will make some laugh will puzzle another. Whereas I found the comedy funny at first, I became bored with it later on: the same mechanisms were always at work, namely exaggeration, and it became tiresome. Although this book is short, I would have enjoyed it yet shorter or with a bit more variety.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This is a look at the misadventures of three men and their dog on a two week voyage on the Thames in the 19th century. I laughed quite a bit and often pictured the men as the three stooges. A fun romp!