Kilo Lingo

English song

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

Lyrics

The round

, , ,

stream.

, , , ,

.

New words in this song

Comprehension drill

4 questions on what you just read. Get one wrong and the story will show you where it says otherwise.

Words first printed 1852, author undetermined and treated as traditional; the tune everyone sings was published by Eliphalet Oram Lyte (1842-1913) in the Franklin Square Song Collection (New York, 1881). Playground extra verses about crocodiles are 20th-century additions and are not printed here. Source text. Translation ours.

The shortest song in this course, and the sneakiest. Four lines, sung as a round - each singer starts one line after the last, and the harmony builds itself. The version here is the one published in 1881, which is the version the whole world sings.

Three words earn their gloss. means to move a boat with oars - and watch the pronunciation, because this row rhymes with go, while the row that means an argument rhymes with now. English does this to you sometimes. A stream is a small river. means happily, in a slightly old-fashioned, storybook way - which is exactly the right flavour here.

And then the philosophy. uses the old sense of but meaning "only": life is only a dream. Eighteen words in, the nursery song has quietly made the strongest claim in the songbook. Sing it gently.