Three Men in a Boat: To Say Nothing of the Dog

I have had Jerome's books in my shelf for a long time, and somehow never got to them - this is the first I have read. It is one of those famous books everyone seems to have read - I don't think it receives rave reviews - but it has a sort of appeal to most.

Published in 1889, it survives aging well and while of course very dated, it is still very readable. There are small elements of the language which are archaic and not in common use now, but not such that it would hinder the reader.

For me, the highlight of the book is the dog - Montmorency.

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.To get somebody to stumble over him, and curse him steadily for an hour, is his highest aim and object; and, when he has succeeded in accomplishing this, his conceit becomes quite unbearable.

Among folk too constitutionally weak, or too constitutionally lazy, whichever ti may be, to relish up-stream work, it is a common practice to get a boat at Oxford, and row down. For the energetic, however, the upstream journey is certainly to be preferred. It does not seem good to be always going with the current. There is more satisfaction in squaring one's back, and fighting against it, and winning one's way forward in spite of it - at least, so I feel, when Harris and George are sculling, and I am steering.