Three Men In A Boat
Ratings97
Average rating3.8
This is a lazy saturday afternoon read. The humor is amusing, it made me laugh out loud at times too. The book doesn't have any emotions, but it does give you a feeling of... insouciance. After reading there's nothing of it left in my head, except for few incidences and jokes. An “enjoy as you read” book.
We all have that one friend who narrates stories, real or made up, so well that he/she has you in splits just by virtue of being articulate. Jerome K Jerome is that friend.
The biggest problem I had with this book was its entirely humourless tone.
After all these years I finally got around to this book. We took it along as an audiobook on our last long trip. It was just as wonderful as I've always heard. Seinfeld, folks. Seinfeld a hundred years ago. Clever. Smart. Funny.
The story is simple: three friends head out on a boat trip down the Thames. All three are a bit lazy and negligent and self-centered. It's all in good fun. A great read. Mustn't miss it.
Very amusing :-D
With parts that weren't funny, like the story of the poor woman, or the dark forest. Nevertheless, enjoyable.
DNF. 2019, the year of terrible books, continues. I really wanted to like it and for a while I thought I might but then I realised I just didn't think it was funny.
Fun! I developed quite a fondness for the narrator. Reminiscent of Mark Twain but with less bite. But I have to admit that I read this pretty lazily – I thought Montmorency was one of the three men in the boat until about halfway through the book when I finally did the math and found that by my count there were four men in the boat, not three. At first I thought it was a joke, but then I considered the book‰ЫЄs subtitle (‰ЫПTo say nothing of the dog‰Ыќ) and realized that Montmorency was, in fact, the dog. In my defense, on our first introduction to Montmorency there is dialogue attributed to him, and I started out reading the non-illustrated Penguin edition and only later switched to an illustrated ebook which had pictures of the dog. Also, the actual story of their trip down the river was not nearly as interesting as the sidebar stories and anecdotes and hypothetical situations, which were the best parts and had little or nothing to do with the dog.
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‰ЫПThrow the lumber over, man! Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need – a homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends, worth the name, someone to love and someone to love you, a cat, a dog, and a pipe or two, enough to eat and enough to wear, and a little more than enough to drink; for thirst is a dangerous thing.‰Ыќ
Brilliant, just brilliant! I recently learned that 5 stars means “it was amazing” on Goodreads. And with that newfound knowledge I'm giving this one 5 stars. It's hilarious through and through - laugh out loud kind of hilarious - struggling to stifle your chuckles on the bus kind of hilarious. I quite literally cried with laughter at points. I can barely believe it was written 130 years ago - it does not show its age at all.
It's cheeky, it's slapstick, it's insightful, it's witty, and it's just so beautifully British. Perfect. I loved it.
Update: Totally just re-read this book within six months. Well, I just enjoyed it so damn much. It was as much fun the second time round, if not more!
Update after third reading: This has become an all-time favourite and I've determined to read it once a year - at least! I still find it so funny that my giggles while reading it have annoyed the people around me.