Discussion Provocation by Bryan White

I started and stopped the writing of this provocation several times as I found myself at a loss for how to provoke with a book that seems so light, fun, and airy, but I then thought about one of the central aspects of the story—the idea that a computer computed that the answer to life, the universe, and everything was simply the number 42, and that if that didn’t make sense, it was because those who were asking needed to come up with a better question. When I think about The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, it itself seems like an answer to the question, “What would a novel look like if an author chose what they found most amusing at every turn with few considerations for plotting, character development, or frankly, how millennia of storytelling have shown us how to tell stories?” Consider our protagonist, Arthur Dent. Traditionally, main characters are the do-ers of the story, but Arthur more than just about any other main character I can think of has things done to him rather than does things. I think first of how, faced with the destruction of his house, his active decision is to—passively lie before the bulldozer.

I think also about how one of the most decried literary devices, the deus ex machina, occurs again and again in this book as our hero and his rag-tag bunch of companions find themselves in troubling circumstances, facing death, and at the last moment, an unknowable force shows up to set things straight and save them—this is particularly interesting in a book that is at least a-religious if not anti-religious. (Admittedly these are not true examples of deus ex machina as a literal god does not show up, but DON’T PANIC.) Consider, for example, Arthur and Ford Prefect being expelled from the Vogon ship and at the absolute, literal, last second, finding themselves on the ship of Zaphod Beeblebrox and Trillian.

I also think of ludicrous plotlines such as one in which someone would become president for the sole purpose of enriching themselves by stealing great pieces of wealth and technology—well, perhaps that isn’t so ludicrous. As these and other things rattled around in my brainbox—surely there must be more to why a towel is so important for interstellar hitchhiking?—some more troubling questions came into my head. What are we to make of the scourge of bureaucracy in this book? Is everybody in the book (and, perhaps, at large) just making it up and lying about it all as they go along (see: the mice at the end)? How am I expected to keep it together when super intelligent shades of the color blue are mentioned but not more fully developed?

But it is here that I myself must take the advice of the book and not panic. This book has remained in the pop cultural zeitgeist for over forty years, having been before that a popular radio play on the BBC. For our discussion tonight, I am very curious how this book hit those of you who read it when you were younger, versus those who are reading it now (like me) for the first time, and I’m also curious how those who listened, versus read, experienced it (knowing that it was first a radio play). With that all said, as we are here meeting at a Restaurant and Brewery at the End of Escondido, we continue the work of Douglas Adams by discussing and considering his work and legacy. I hope you brought your towels.