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jazzy_daveJerome K. Jerome "Three Men In A Boat" (Penguin Classics)
This is meandering and relatable and silly and almost infinitely charming. It’s pastiche and satire and travelogue and slice-of-life all rolled into one, with an unreliable narrator, long set-ups to the jokes, and pratfalls. So many pratfalls. Victorian literature this is not! Except that, of course, it is.
I’m still mulling over how Jerome made this work. It shouldn’t. There’s no plot or character development, just a series of moments and memories and general buffoonery. There’s barely even dialogue as we’re used to it! But the characters, especially the narrator J, absolutely shine, and everything from the episodes to the colloquial narration feels timeless and familiar.
I think the real beauty of this book is that it works on many levels, because while I’m talking up the “look at this doofuses” comedy stuff, this is also a travelogue. It does tell you the sites and the history and the good pubs. It just also happens to be so over-the-top about it that it becomes a parody of travel guides—and there is the time capsule aspect too. Jerome’s portrait of English life and the Thames Valley of the 1880s is perfect. It’s a reminder that however stuffy the Victorians seem, they also had a fabulous sense of humour about themselves.
Recommended to anyone who likes silly British people or silly British books, but especially to fans of P.G. Wodehouse.
Warnings: One instance of the n-slur. Two instances of the g-slur within a single paragraph. One use of “Oriental” in reference to fashion. Victorian opinions of women not necessarily shared by the author.
This is meandering and relatable and silly and almost infinitely charming. It’s pastiche and satire and travelogue and slice-of-life all rolled into one, with an unreliable narrator, long set-ups to the jokes, and pratfalls. So many pratfalls. Victorian literature this is not! Except that, of course, it is.
I’m still mulling over how Jerome made this work. It shouldn’t. There’s no plot or character development, just a series of moments and memories and general buffoonery. There’s barely even dialogue as we’re used to it! But the characters, especially the narrator J, absolutely shine, and everything from the episodes to the colloquial narration feels timeless and familiar.
I think the real beauty of this book is that it works on many levels, because while I’m talking up the “look at this doofuses” comedy stuff, this is also a travelogue. It does tell you the sites and the history and the good pubs. It just also happens to be so over-the-top about it that it becomes a parody of travel guides—and there is the time capsule aspect too. Jerome’s portrait of English life and the Thames Valley of the 1880s is perfect. It’s a reminder that however stuffy the Victorians seem, they also had a fabulous sense of humour about themselves.
Recommended to anyone who likes silly British people or silly British books, but especially to fans of P.G. Wodehouse.
Warnings: One instance of the n-slur. Two instances of the g-slur within a single paragraph. One use of “Oriental” in reference to fashion. Victorian opinions of women not necessarily shared by the author.
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