David Parker: Narrow Boat: The book that changed Britain

Narrow Boat is the story of Tom Rolt’s journey through the lost world of England’s canals.

Spending the first months of wartime Britain on Cressy, his converted working narrow boat, he documented everything he witnessed about the decline of England’s inland waterways, a network that had driven the country’s first industrial revolution.

Published during the War (1944), the book found a growing readership in the post-war years, when its vision of a lost landscape resonated with a new sense of hope and optimism. It was a sensation and has never since been out of print.

In this illustrated talk, using archive film clips from the period, David Parker will show how ‘Narrow Boat’ came to be written, its astonishing reception, and just how the book and its author changed the face of Britain’s canals.