The novel "Three Men in a Boat," written by English author Jerome K. Jerome and published in 1889, is a humorous story about a boat trip in the Thames River that J. takes with his friends George and William Samuel Harris. Jerome’s prose is long-winding and digresses into anecdotes or observational passages quite often.
"Three Men in a Boat" was initially intended to be a serious travel guide, with accounts of local history along the route, but the humorous elements took over to the point where the serious and somewhat sentimental passages seem a distraction to the comic novel. One of the most praised things about "Three Men in a Boat" is how undated it appears to modern readers, the jokes seem fresh and witty even today.
The three men are based on Jerome himself (the narrator J.) and two real-life friends.
