Row, Row, Row Your Boat

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"Row, Row, Row Your Boat" is a nursery rhyme, and a popular children's song/proverb, often sung as a round. It can also be an 'action' nursery rhyme where singers sit opposite one another and 'row' forwards and backwards with joined hands. The tune is credited to Eliphalet Oram Lyte in the publication The Franklin Square Song Collection (1881, New York), which also indicates that he adapted the lyric:

Row, row, row your boat,

Gently down the stream.

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,

Life is but a dream.

The lyrics have often been used as a metaphor for life's difficult choices, and many see the boat as referring to one's self or a group which one identifies with [1]. Rowing is a skillful, if tedious, practice that takes perfection but also directs the vessel [2]. When sung as a group, the act of rowing becomes a unifier, as oars must be in sync in a rowboat. The idea that man travels along a certain stream, suggests boundaries in the path of choices and in free will [3]. The third line recommends that challenges should be greeted in stride while open to joy with a smile [4]. The final line, life is but a dream, is perhaps the most meaningful [5]. In a religious setting, life and the physical plane can become a veil or dreamlike state that man must awake from. Conversely, the line can just as equally convey nihilist sentiments on the meaninglessness of man's actions. The line is also commonly sung as "life is like a dream" rather than "life is but a dream", possibly to sound happier, less meaningful, and more appropriate for its audience of young children.

[edit] Additional verses

Row, row, row the boat

Gently down the stream

If you see a crocodile

Don't forget to scream

Row, row, row the boat

Gently down the river

If you see a polar bear

Don't forget to shiver

Row, row, row the boat

Gently to the shore

If you see a lion

Don't forget to roar

Row, row, row the boat

Gently in the bath

If you see a spider

Don't forget to laugh

Row, row, row the boat

Gently as can be

'Cause if you're not careful

You'll fall into the sea!

Rock, rock, rock the boat

Gently to and fro

If you do it hard enough

Into the water you go

[edit] Alternate Lyrics

There are alternate versions to the original Verse, mostly less pleasant. One well known version amongst British school children is as follows:

Row, row, row the boat

Gently down the stream

Throw your teachers overboard

And listen to them scream!

Another version goes:

Row, row, row your boat,

Gently down the stream.

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,

Like a submarine.

Mister Rogers version:

Propel, propel, propel your craft,

Softly down the liquid solution.

Ecstatically, ecstatically, ecstatically, ecstatically,

Existance is but an illusion.

Tré Cool's version:

Roll, roll, roll a joint,

Twist it at the end.

Light it up and take a puff

And pass it to your friends!

[edit] In popular culture

• It was sung by Captain Kirk and Leonard McCoy at the beginning of the film Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. Unfortunately, they could not quite get Mr. Spock to join in, because the Vulcan was "trying to comprehend the words".
• It appears in the film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
• It is named in A Series of Unfortunate Events as Violet Baudelaire's least favorite song. Lemony Snicket describes it as "a well known hymn of naval disaster".
• A fragment is sung by Lo Wang in the first level of Shadow Warrior.
• A fragment is sung by the virus during the attack on the Ellingson Mineral Corporation mainframe in the film Hackers
• In the Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog episode "Robolympics", Sonic sings his version of the song.
• In the Stargate SG-1 series, in episode Urgo all members of SG-1 team sing the song.
• In the pilot episode of CBS's night-time soap, Knots Landing, Diana (Claudia Lonow) and her step-sister, Annie (Karen Allen) drive drunk in the car singing the chorus.
• In The Backyardigans episode, The Yeti, sung with modified lyrics.
• In the film Dante's Peak, the main characters sing it in a round to calm the children down while they are navigating the acidic lake.
• It appears in The Simpsons episode The Wettest Stories Ever Told, during the Mutiny on the Bounty story. It is sung in the Round by the crew of The Bounty and then, after the mutiny by Groundskeeper Willie on his own, although still attempting to sing a round.
• The song is quoted in the Tool song Third Eye.
• The song occurs as part of a fragment of Home by Alexi Murdoch, as the accompaniment to the gravity-aided demise of Charles "Haywire" Patoshik, a lunatic escapee in the TV series Prison Break.
• Tom Waits seemingly pays tribute to the nursury rhyme in "Misery is the River of the World" on his Blood Money Album. He exclaims "Everybody Row! Everybody Row!"