Text analysis “Three men in the boat”.

I’d like to tell you about my analysis of the story “Three men in the boat”. It is a very interesting story written by Jerome K. Jerome. He is one of the popular and well-known English authors. He is famous for writing essays, short stories, and novels. Especially, he is famous for his special humor, all his stories are based on that sparkling manner of writing.
The story "Three men in the boat" by Jerome K.Jerome presents that three men with a dog stayed at the village. The action centers after their decision to stay at one of the shiplake islands for a night. Then, they decided to make a supper, using all the ingredients and remains of food they have. The initial paragraph shows how they'd finished cooking. The last paragraph describes that they've enjoyed an excellent supper. Text is divided into four sections. The climax of the story is episode when dog brings a water-rat and friends decided whether they will put it in the Irish stew or not.
The main character of the story is George. In my opinion, he is very experienced and educated man, because he’ll find a way to solve all the problems, and he knows how to behave in any kind of situation. George is leader, he makes decisions and his friends follow him. Through the story I noticed: “George said”, “George did something”. Also, he is brave but on the other hand prefers to be on the safe side and “not try experiments”, he is careful. George is very economical.
The main theme of the story, in my opinion, is “three friends’ supper”, and the idea of the story is “extraordinary solving of the friends’ problem”. Actually, this phrase from the text may also show the idea: “I don’t think I ever enjoyed a meal more. There was something so fresh and piquant about it. ..Here was a dish with a taste like nothing else on earth.” It means their great success in cooking supper. The mood in the story is rather emotional and ironic, realistic. In some parts its cheerful, in some – quite and restful, lyrical for example in describing nature. Tonality in the story is very enthusiastic, rather bright and emotional.
Now I’d like to tell you about the realization of the idea on different levels. As for the choice of words, in this text author uses more bookish words, than colloquial. In the beginning, in the description of Sonning author uses bookish words to create the mood (for example: undertaking). He also uses colloquial words in the description of cooking process (get rid of, etc). Choice of vocabulary tells us about the characters of the story.
To express the idea, author uses many stylistic devices such as irony – because he wants to show humorous situations; metaphors, such as fairy-like nook, extraordinary shape, smothered in roses; epithet, for example, sweet Sonning; and zeugma – scraping potatoes/scraping ourselves. The story is full of funny comic situations, and he uses these stylistic devices to make them brighter. These devices help reader to understand the main idea of the text better.
All in all, the text presents that you can do something good even if you are not sure, you must try something new. As for my impression, after reading this story I realized, that before having something one should make it. So, I guess Jerome K. Jerome gives a wise lesson to his readers. I recommend this interesting story to everyone.

 

 

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome - Summary
The story beings by introducing the main characters - George, Harris, 'J' (Jerome, the narrator) and Montmorency, the dog. The men are spending an evening in J's room, smoking and idly discussing various illnesses they fancy they are suffering from. They conclude they are suffering from 'overwork' and are badly in need of a holiday. The options of a stay in the country and a sea-trip are considered, then rejected (J. describes the bad experiences had by his brother-in-law and another unnamed friend on sea-trips). The three eventually decide upon a boating trip up the Thames during which they'll camp-out, notwithstanding more anecdotes from J. regarding previous mishaps with tents and camping stoves.

The next Saturday, they embark. George must go into work that morning ("George goes to sleep at a bank from ten to four each day, except Saturdays, when they wake him up and put him outside at two") so J. and Harris make their way to Kingston by train. Unable to find the correct train at Waterloo Station, they resort to bribing a train driver to take his train to Kingston where they collect their hired boat and start upon their journey. They meet George later in the day, up-river at Weybridge.

The remainder of the story relates their leisurely journey up the river and the incidents that occur. The book's original purpose as a guidebook is apparent as the narrator describes the many landmarks and villages they pass by such as Hampton Court Palace, Monkey Island, Magna Carta Island and Marlow, and he muses upon the historical associations of these places. However, he frequently digresses into funny anecdotes that range in subject from the unreliability of barometers for weather forecasting to Harris' hopeless ineptness at singing Gilbert and Sullivan comic songs (that contrasts with his belief that he has a talent for it). The most frequent topics are river pastimes such as fishing and boating and the difficulties they may present to the unwary.

The book includes several classic comic set-pieces, such as the plaster of Paris trout in chapter seventeen and the "Irish stew" in chapter fourteen - made by mixing together most of the leftover items in the party's food hamper.