Three Men on the Bummel

I wrote three paragraphs of a story, and then read them over to myself. Some unkind things have been said about my work; but nothing has yet been written which would have done justice to those three paragraphs. I threw them into the waste-paper basket, and sat trying to remember what, if any, charitable institutions provided pensions for decayed authors.

I was so ready for

Three Men on the Bummel to join

Three Men in a Boat as a favorite.

And, in fact, the parts of the book that recount the trials and tribulations of the trio’s travels are just as good. There’s something about Jerome K. Jerome’s sense of humor that, miraculously, completely translates to the twenty-first century. From the chaos of remodeling to the antics of young children to the challenges of a language or accent barrier to the humorous double-standards married couples unintentionally apply to one another to the desire to attempt a mechanical repair one is completely unequipped for (in Jerome’s case, repair of a bicycle, but it’s too easy to see the same scenario unfolding with a car), not only is his writing literally laugh-out-loud funny, but it makes Victorian people seem somehow more real, more human, than more serious Victorian literature. The stories are very episodic, but I enjoy the episodes so much that I don’t mind.

Where

Three Men on the Bummel falls flat is Jerome’s extended commentary on German culture. From how they like their landscaping (meticulous) to how they treat their horses (very well) to what Jerome thinks of their proclivity for student fencing (barbaric)…it isn’t that entertaining and doesn’t feel especially authentic, and it goes on and on and

on. There is also the fact that Jerome attempts to imitate various accents/patois, which I can’t stand because of how hard it is to read (and part of it comes across as incredibly racist, complete with a surprise N-word, which is a bit of a shock).

The parts I liked, I loved; the parts I didn’t, bored me to tears.

Still, I’m looking forward to reading more from him!

Favorite passages:

He asked them if they had seen his wife. They asked him what she was like. He did not know enough Dutch to describe her properly; all he could tell them was she was a very beautiful woman, of medium size. Evidently this did not satisfy them, the description was too general; any man could say that, and by this means perhaps get possession of a wife that did not belong to him. They asked him how she was dressed; for the life of him he could not recollect. I doubt if any man could tell how any woman was dressed ten minutes after he had left her.

The meeting was not a tender one. Mrs. Harris is not a good actress, and always has great difficulty in disguising her feelings. On this occasion, she frankly admits, she made no attempt to disguise them.

He said: “It has been an idea of mine that the right saddle is to be found.” I said: “You give up that idea; this is an imperfect world of joy and sorrow mingled. There may be a better land where bicycle saddles are made out of rainbow, stuffed with cloud; in this world the simplest thing is to get used to something hard.

When you are wearing a pair of stout boots, things get out of your way; when you venture among furniture in woolwork slippers and no socks, it comes at you and kicks you.

It vexes Ethelbertha my shaving quickly. She fears that to outsiders it may suggest a poor-spirited attempt at suicide, and that in consequence it may get about the neighbourhood that we are not happy together.

Her dress I cannot describe: my grandfather, poor gentleman, might have been able to do so; it would have been more familiar to him. I can only say that it appeared to me unnecessarily short, exhibiting a pair of ankles—if I may be permitted to refer to such points—that, from an artistic point of view, called rather for concealment.

I tried driving a hansom cab once. That has always been regarded as the acme of modern Tom and Jerryism.

“What is a ‘Bummel’?” said George. “How would you translate it?” “A ‘Bummel’,” I explained, “I should describe as a journey, long or short, without an end; the only thing regulating it being the necessity of getting back within a given time to the point from which one started. Sometimes it is through busy streets, and sometimes through the fields and lanes; sometimes we can be spared for a few hours, and sometimes for a few days. But long or short, but here or there, our thoughts are ever on the running of the sand. We nod and smile to many as we pass; with some we stop and talk awhile; and with a few we walk a little way. We have been much interested, and often a little tired. But on the whole we have had a pleasant time, and are sorry when ’tis over.”