IT has, said comedian Griff Rhys Jones, kept his good mate Rory McGrath and himself in work for seven TV series, so it was only proper they came to show their appreciation to Victorian comic writer Jerome K Jerome.

The Three Men In A Boat author’s former home in Bloomsbury was marked with a plaque today (Wednesday). 

Organised by the Marchmont Association, the tribute is as part of their campaign to honour the area’s history. The comedians were joined by Jerome K Jerome enthusiasts decked out in blazers and boaters and included members of the writer’s appreciation society that celebrate his classic comedy about three friends who take a chaotic boating holiday on the River Thames.

Mr Rhys Jones said: “I think myself and Rory have made more out of his book than he did. We’ve been on the TV a lot because of it.”

Griff Rhys Jones, Rory McGrath, Catherine Larner, Jacq Barnard, Lucy Hollis from Deben Rowing Club in Suffolk at the unveiling

Mr Rhys Jones said that the book – which has never been out of print since it was first published in 1898, and has been translated into every major language around the world – was as funny today as it was back then. He said: “He wrote a hit book and it has continued to be a hit. I think the secret is the way he tapped into a rich vein about male mateyness. It is the staple of today’s sitcoms – it is about male friendship and make bonding.”

He added it caught the mood of late-Victorian society. He said: “It is about leisure, about holidays, and this was quite a new concept at the end of the 19th century. It was first time people who had jobs could take holidays, so they understood the book.”

It was also a boom time for the River Thames, he added. “It introduced to the Thames the idea of leisure boating,” he said.

“The coming of the railways provided the means to get to places like Henley or Maidenhead and  removed commercial traffic from the river – which meant three men could get into a boat.”

Meanwhile, the painter and critic Roger Fry has also been honoured by the association. 

Mr Fry, a member of the Bloomsbury Group who was friends with the likes of Vanessa Bell and Virginia Woolf, lived in Bernard Street in his later years. As well as being known for managing a studio that produced ceramics, furniture and cutting-edge interior design, he was a champion of Modernism and is seen as the man who introduced modern art to London. 

The memorial, which was unveiled on Friday by National Portrait Gallery director Sandy Nairne, is the second marking the critic’s life in Camden: his studio, the Omega Workshops in Fitzroy Square, also has a plaque.

Mark Fry and Sandy Nairne at the unveiling of the Roger Fry plaque

Mr Nairne said: “In a sense, it is Roger Fry who invents modern art. Here is a man who is a brilliant critic and great writer, who is a wonderful curator and maker of exhibitions, who spent a period working at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, but also continued as an artist. And for any of us who work in the art industry we know it is very unusual for those three strands to continue throughout life.”

Among the guests were family members Mark Fry and Sam Clarke, and Richard Shone, editor of the Burlington Magazine which was founded by Roger Fry and others in 1903.