Boating

by Christopher J. Dodd

'There is nothing -- absolutely nothing -- half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats', said Ratty to Mole, a sentiment doubted by Montmorency, the dog who skiffed with Jerome K. Jerome's three men, but echoed by picnickers, punters, and pleasure-seekers as well as competitive rowers and scullers the world over. Christopher Dodd, the Guardian's Deputy Features Editor and rowing correspondent, has chosen a varied and entertaining selection of anecdotes from Kenneth Grahame's classic to East Germany's coaching manual. There are true-life accounts of triumphs and disasters in the Boat Race, at Henley, on the Thames and the Wear, memoirs of rowing's greats and gurus, of humble and proud heroes of fiction. From Beerbohm's bewitching Zuleika Dobson to Kipling's vision of the galleys, from tea at Richmond with Dr. Furnivall and the ABC girls to a Tyneside dance, from Dickens's Lambeth to tiffin in Shanghai, "Boating" adds wit and wisdom to the charm of the oar and the lure of the river. Dodd is a journalist turned writer and historian, specializing in rowing. After thirty years helping to edit the Guardian, he co-founded the River & Rowing Museum at Henley-on-Thames, where he is a historian and curator. He was the founding co-editor, with Rachel Quarrell, of Rowing Voice, an independent electronic magazine which entered the air waves after the success of the Eton Mess daily publication at the World Rowing Championships in 2006. The Voice covers the big events like nobody else, and occasionally blogs (voice.rowingservice.com).

120 pages, Hardcover

First published March 17, 1983

About the author

Christopher John "Chris" Dodd is an American lawyer and Democratic politician currently serving as the senior U.S. Senator from Connecticut.

Dodd is a Connecticut native and a graduate of Georgetown Preparatory School in Bethesda, Maryland, and Providence College. His father, Thomas J. Dodd, was one of Connecticut's United States Senators from 1959-1971. Chris Dodd served in the Peace Corps for two years prior to entering law school at the University of Louisville, and during law school concurrently served in the United States Army Reserve.

Dodd returned to Connecticut, winning election in 1974 to the United States House of Representatives from Connecticut's 2nd congressional district and was reelected in 1976 and 1978. He was elected United States Senator in the elections of 1980, and is now the longest-serving Senator in Connecticut's history, the 9th most senior of current Senators and one of three from the 1980 freshman class who are still serving.

Dodd served as general chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1995 to 1997. He currently serves as Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. In 2006, Dodd decided to run for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States, but eventually withdrew after running behind several other competitors.