Popular from the very start and never out of print. Three Men in a Boat remains as fresh and funny today as when it was first published in 1889.This adaptation is by a modern master of comedy, playwright Tom Stoppard Shakespeare in Love, The Russia House, Empire of the Sun, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Brazil Oscar nominated co writer. One hot June day, three friends decide there is nothing they would like to do more than to get away from London. A boating holiday with lots of fresh air and exercise would be the very thing, or so their doctors tell them. So after debating the merits of hotel or camp beds and what to pack, they set off on their voyage a trip up the Thames from Henley to Oxford with a few diversions into pubs, museums and friends homes.