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support his family. With the help of his father’s old friend he got the place of a
clerk in the London Railway Office and received two pounds a week.
Office work did not interest Jerome and he took up teaching, journalism
and acting. For three years he was an actor, first in amateur performances, later
at small theatres. In his free moments Jerome tried to write. He wrote plays,
stories and articles. But nothing was published.
His first literary success was a one-act comedy that was performed in the
Globe Theatre in 1886 and ran there for some time. In 1889 a collection of his
articles and short stories about theatre life was published. At the same time
Jerome began to publish some of his articles that later made up a book under the
title The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow. This book became very popular in
England.
On Stage and Off (1885) and The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow (1886)
were lighthearted essays which set the tone for his most enduring work, Three
Men in a Boat (1889), about an accident-prone rowing holiday on the Thames.
Three Men on the Bummel (1900) took the same characters on a tour of Germany.
The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow and Three Men in a Boat made the
author famous. The books were translated into several European languages.
Jerome founded The Idler, a humorous periodical, in 1892, and wrote
many plays with some contemporary success. Best known of these was The
Passing of the Third Floor Back (l907).
In 1899 Jerome went traveling all over Europe and visited Petersburg
where he was met with enthusiasm. He knew well Russian literature and it
influenced some of his books.
Jerome also tried to write serious books but the readers did not like them.
Several times Jerome expressed Ins anticolonial views on the policy of Britain in
China and other countries of the East.
His own favourite work was Paul Kelver (1902), an autobiographical
novel. Jerome's last book was his autobiography My Life and Times (1926). He
died in 1927.
5.14. The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Founded by the best of the 20
th
-century British musicians, Sir Thomas
Beecham, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra gave its first concert on 15
September 1946 and was an immediate success. During the first years of its
existence the made more than 100 records, many of which are still in the record
catalogues, while other are constantly being reissued.
Until 1963, two years after Beecham’s death, the PRO was governed by a
private company but then, in line with the other three London independent
orchestras, the orchestras members took over the company. Each player is a
shareholding member of RPO Ltd, and they elect 110 directors, six of whom are
players, three businessmen and the managing director of the orchestra. In 1966
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