The five book trilogy

[manored]

If you have never readed at least one book from it, you have never readed anything. You have never actual been born!

http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/hhgg.html

The only bad thing about it is that its too short and the author is dead. DAM YOU NATURE!

You will also find the text based adventure game there. Its quite fun: you can even suicide :)

[El Idiot]

Best series ever. Ever.
"This was because Reason was in fact out to lunch."
"The story so far:
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move. "
"It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination."
"A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof was to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools."

[Snipawolf]

Five book trilogy

[SinbadEV]

Mostly Harmless tag line was "Book 5 in the increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy" I think.

[manored]

Five book trilogy

its on purpose :)

[tombom]

I've read all of them except Mostly Harmless, which I think he said he considers a mistake which was written the way it was because his publisher was demanding another installment and he was very depressed at the time.

[SinbadEV]

I'd still suggest reading Mostly Harmless despite the obviously bitter nature of the thing.

[manored]

Yeah the end of the fourth looks like some sort of end, tough the fourth as the less fun of all so I wouldnt like if it ended on it :) Beside considering it was written by Douglams Adams too it cant be bad.

[kiki]

i have only read number 1, and I am impatient to go to lunch.

[SLizer]

the all-in-one version published some years ago had nice little text on how to get a lift off the planet. Nearly wet myself on public when I read it

[Felix the Cat]

I've got the all-in-one, and it's been read cover-to-cover at least five times.

[SinbadEV]

I bought the all in one and it turned out to be missing Young Zaphod Plays it Safe.

[Felix the Cat]

I bought the all in one and it turned out to be missing Young Zaphod Plays it Safe.

Interesting, mine has it...

[Neddie]

The earlier publication before the fifth book was written had it...

[SLizer]

I never really got the Zaphod thingy. Never really concentrated on it though- Was there something more to it?

[Caydr]

Heh, I knew what book you were talking about just by seeing the subject.

I think the official designation is "The increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhiker Trilogy".

I didn't get Young Zaphod in my megabook, but I bought.... what was it... "The Salmon of Doubt" or something? I think it had Young Zaphod and a collection of other DA stuff, mostly writings about why Macs are so great... ...It's like finding out your favourite author is a transvestite.

It's really sad the guy died before he got a chance to finish the story properly. The fifth book was garbage, I'd rather have a 4-book compilation and pretend the fifth never happened.

Hahaha, here's a great excerpt from Salmon:

"COOKIES

This actually did happen to a real person, and the real person is me. I had gone to catch a train. This was April 1976, in Cambridge, UK. I was a bit early for the train. I'd gotten the time of the train wrong. I went to get myself a newspaper to do the crossword, and a cup of coffee and a packet of cookies. I went and sat at a table. I want you to picture the scene. It's very important that you get this very clear in your mind. Here's the table, newspaper, cup of coffee, packet of cookies. There's a guy sitting opposite me, perfectly ordinary-looking guy wearing a business suit, carrying a briefcase. It didn't look like he was going to do anything weird. What he did was this: he suddenly leaned across, picked up the packet of cookies, tore it open, took one out, and ate it.

Now this, I have to say, is the sort of thing the British are very bad at dealing with. There's nothing in our background, upbringing, or education that teaches you how to deal with someone who in broad daylight has just stolen your cookies. You know what would happen if this had been South Central Los Angeles. there would have very quickly been gunfire, helicopters coming in, you know... But in the end, I did what any red-blooded Englishman would do: I ignored it. And I stared at the newspaper, took a sip of coffee, tried to do a clue in the newspaper, couldn't do anything, and thought, What am I going to do?

In the end I thought, Nothing for it, I'll just have to go for it, and tried very hard not to notice the fact that the packet was already mysteriously opened. I took out a cookie for myself. I thought, That settled him. But it hadn't because a moment or two later he did it again. He took another cookie. Having not mentioned it the first time, it was somehow even harder to raise the subject the second time around. "Excuse me, I couldn't help but notice..." I mean, it doesn't really work.

We went through he whole packet like this. When I say the whole packet, I mean there were only about eight cookies, but it felt like a lifetime. He took one, I took one, he took one, I took one. Finally when we got to the end he stood up and walked away. Well, we exchanged meaningful looks, then he walked away, and I breathed a sigh of relief and sat back.

A moment or two later the train was coming in, so I tossed back the rest of my coffee, stood up, picked up the newspaper, and underneath the newspaper were my cookies. The thing I like particularly about this story is the sensation that somewhere in England there has been wandering around for the last quarter-century a perfectly ordinary guy who's had the same exact story, only he doesn't have the punch line."

---

Sorry if there's typos, I've gotta run before I can proofread that.

[Felix the Cat]

I never really got the Zaphod thingy. Never really concentrated on it though- Was there something more to it?

My interpretation was that the escaped Genuine People Personality was Ronald Reagan...

[Zoombie]

Yeah, I thought that too. I personally loved the Salmon of Doubt, because it was the book that solidified the vague idea in my mind that not only did I not care about God, but that I frankly didn't believe he existed, and was in fact an Atheist.

As far as spiritual teachers go, Douglas Adams is a good one to choose, no?

[HeavyLancer]

Reminds me of one of Douglas Adams' quotes:

"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?"

Now THAT is a good spiritual teacher.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

mostly writings about why Macs are so great... ...It's like finding out your favourite author is a transvestite

cadyr is big win