Don’t Explore Questions of the Universe Without This Guide!! (This Sale is Absurd!)

The guide is, of course, Douglas Adams’ humorous sci-fi radio show, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galax, originally broadcasted by BBC Radio 4 on March 8, 1978. Most people would be confused if you told them sci-fi is about the present rather than the future. What? You’re telling me high-speed space travel, Vogon poetry—the third worst in the universe—and the destruction of Earth actually reflect present-day life? Life is boring and makes no sense!

Exactly. People read and write to escape their current world while simultaneously making commentary on it. Right now, I’m analyzing the past’s version of the future from a point in the future that is still in the past.

What I’m trying to say is The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is related to human curiosity, dealing with life, and the many present-day unknowns we have to live with.

What are aliens like? What would it be like to travel the galaxy? These questions especially represent the time period of when the original radio show aired, about ten years after the U.S. moon landing. Speaking of human curiosity, Arthur and Ford discover that the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything is 42.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy uses absurdist humor to make realizations about life easier to handle. Also, life is absurd. Why can’t the answer to the universe be 42?

Analyzing anything funny instantly kills the joke, but from a humor writing standpoint, specific numbers are always funnier.  

Parts of the plot also address politics of the late 70s and early 80s that still affect us today. The fictional destruction of Earth could connect to climate change anxiety. Teasers, the wealthy kids who prank “some poor unsuspecting soul,” are a political symbol of privilege. (Adams). Plus, the idea of the Vogons pokes fun at bureaucracy and the terrible poetry scattered throughout the universe seems to be making fun of snooty poets and false intellectuals.

But returning to dealing with life, in Episode 2, Ford says, “I don’t want to go to heaven with a headache.” (Adam.)

Worrying about something so trivial at such an important moment is humorous, along with his comments to Arthur about how he should have listened more to what his mother told him:

“Why, what did she tell you?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t listen” (Adams).  

Ford’s dialogue touches on the ever-present debate of what we should consider important in this life. But don’t ask Ford, because he didn’t listen.

The voice actors add to the humor as well by delivering such absurd lines with complete seriousness. But I’ll admit I prefer the book to the radio show because, much like Ford, I have trouble listening and focusing.  

Now, if you’ll excuse me, Vogon poetry is next to go on sale, and I’d rather not stick around for that.