Article 4061 of alt.fan.douglas-adams: Xref: vela alt.fan.douglas-adams:4061 news.answers:4040 Path: vela!cs.uiuc.edu!wupost!waikato.ac.nz!comp.vuw.ac.nz!kauri.vuw.ac.nz!gnat Newsgroups: alt.fan.douglas-adams,news.answers Subject: alt.fan.douglas-adams FAQ Message-ID: From: gnat@kauri.vuw.ac.nz (Nathan Torkington) Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1992 11:00:16 GMT Reply-To: douglas-adams-faq@vuw.ac.nz Sender: news@comp.vuw.ac.nz (News Admin) Followup-To: alt.fan.douglas-adams Organization: Dept. of Comp. Sci., Victoria Uni. of Wellington, New Zealand. Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.Edu Supersedes: Nntp-Posting-Host: kauri.vuw.ac.nz Originator: gnat@kauri.vuw.ac.nz Lines: 570 Archive-name: douglas-adams-FAQ Maintained-by: douglas-adams-faq@vuw.ac.nz ---------------------------------------- FOREWORD Buy "Don't Panic" by Neil Gaiman. It is the best guide to 'The Guide' that is around. Relevant details are : TITLE: Don't Panic SUBTITLE: The Official Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy Companion AUTHOR: Neil Gaiman PUBLISHER: Titan Books Ltd, 58 St Giles High St London WC2H 8LH. PAGES: 182pp. ISBN: 1-85286-013-8 PRICE: UK price L3.95. (with appropriate salaams to Scott Telford (s.telford@ed.ac.uk) for kindly posting this data so that we may all benefit from his great knowledge and wisdom) There is allegedly a new edition of this, in the works. Stay tuned. ---------------------------------------- This is the list of frequently asked questions (and their answers) for the newsgroup alt.fan.douglas-adams. There is biographical information about Douglas Adams, a list of his books and their ISBN numbers, as well as information about his boks and other fun stuff. Where possible, pointers to existing information (such as books, magazine articles, and ftp sites) are included here, rather than rehashing that information again. Information is provided without guarantee -- if you get stung using any of the information provided here, or send off your personal fortune and are stuck, then I accept no blame or responsibility. It's your own damn fault. If you haven't already done so, now is as good a time as any to read the guide to Net etiquette which is posted to news.announce.newusers regularly. You should be familiar with acronyms like FAQ, FTP and IMHO, as well as know about smileys, followups and when to reply to email to postings. This FAQ is currently posted to news.answers and alt.fan.pratchett. All posts to news.answers are archived, and it is possible to retrieve the last posted copy via anonymous FTP from pit-manager.mit.edu as /pub/usenet/alt.fan.douglas-adams/douglas-adams-FAQ. Those without FTP access should send e-mail to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with "send usenet/news.answers/finding-sources" in the body to find out how to do FTP by e-mail. This FAQ was mostly written by Nathan Torkington, with numerous contributions by readers of alt.fan.douglas-adams. Comments and indications of doubt are enclosed in []s in the text. Each section begins with forth dashes ("-") on a line of their own, then the section number. This should make searching for a specific section easy. Contributions, comments and changes should be directed to douglas-adams-faq@vuw.ac.nz ---------------------------------------- List of Answers 1 Biographical Information 1.1 Who the heck is Douglas Adams 1.2 What's this about the barrister? 2 Bibliographical Information 2.1 What are the books about? 2.2 Hitchhiker's Guide Series 2.3 Dirk Gently Series 2.4 Liff Books 2.5 Other Books 2.6 Young Zaphod Plays It Safe 2.7 Dr Who and Douglas Adams 3 Douglas Adams and Computers 3.1 Macintoshes 3.2 Computer Games 3.3 Magazine Articles 3.4 CD-ROM Edition of "Last Chance to See" 4 Mechandising 4.1 Audio Tapes 4.2 Albums 4.3 CDs 4.4 Videos 4.5 CD-ROM Edition of "Last Chance to See" 4.5 The Order of Everything 5 Explanations 5.1 The Ending to "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" 5.2 Young Zaphod Plays It Safe 6 Miscellaneous 6.1 Stuff 6.2 Number Games 6.3 Other Authors 6.4 The Future 6.5 Related Electronic Information ---------------------------------------- 1 Biographical Information In this section you will find information on Douglas Adams. The information isn't very detailed, because of (a) a desire to respect his privacy, and (b) you might as well buy "Don't Panic" anyway (see the very start of the file for information on Don't Panic). ---------------------------------------- 1.1 Who the heck is Douglas Adams Douglas Noel Adams (DNA) was born in 1952. [Anything else we need to know?] ---------------------------------------- 1.2 What's this about the barrister? After nearly a decade of saying in his blurbs that he was nearly married to a lady barrister, on November 25 1991 Douglas Adams and Jane Belson tied the knot in a quiet ceremony at Finsbury town hall in London. Bad luck, ladies. They will live in Islington. ---------------------------------------- 2 Bibliographical Information In this section you will find descriptions of DNA's books, the information you need to order any of them, and information about Douglas Adams writing for Dr Who (not really *bibliographic* information, but what are you going to do - kick down my door and shoot me?). The entries are in this format: %T means title, %A means author, %I means imprint, %D means date, %I means ISBN number and %Z means a comment. ---------------------------------------- 2.1 What are the books about? Buy them and find out. Essentially, all the "Hitchhiker's Guide To the Galaxy" series form a trilogy in five parts about one man's travels through the universe after (and before) the Earth is accidentally destroyed. These have been reissued in various forms. The Dirk Gently books form a loosely-bound detective series. The Liff books are dictionaries of words, giving means to words which previously spend their lives loitering about at the top of signposts, and giving words to meanings which needed them. "Deeper" is an expanded form of "Liff", with somem definitions changed, and others omitted all-together. "Last Chance To See" tells of his trip around the world, looking for endangered species. Very funny, and very serious. ---------------------------------------- 2.2 Hitchhiker's Guide Series %T The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %T The Restaurant at the End of the Universe %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %T Life, The Universe and Everything %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %T So Long, and Thanks for All The Fish %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %T Mostly Harmless %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %T The Complete Radio Scripts %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %Z The radio series scripts (not part of the trilogy). %T The Hitchhiker's Trilogy %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %Z A collection of the first three books. %T The Hitchhiker's Omnibus %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %Z A collection of the first four books. %T The More Than Complete Hitchhiker's Guide %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %Z The first four books, with the short story "Young Zaphod Plays It %Z Safe". [Is this the Compleat?] ---------------------------------------- 2.3 Dirk Gently Series %T Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I %T The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul %A Douglas Adams %D %C %I ---------------------------------------- 2.4 Liff Books %T The Meaning of Liff %A Douglas Adams and John Lloyd %D %C %I %T The Deeper Meaning of Liff %A Douglas Adams and John Lloyd %D %C %I ---------------------------------------- 2.5 Other Books %T Last Chance to See %A Douglas Adams and Mark Carwardine %D %C %I %T The Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book %A Douglas Adams and Peter Fincham (editors) %D 1986 %C Fontana %I ---------------------------------------- 2.6 Young Zaphod Plays It Safe The short-story "Young Zaphod Plays it Safe" originally appeared in "The Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book", edited by Douglas Adams and Peter Fincham. It was published by Fontana in Great Britain in 1986. The story also appeared in the "More Than Complete Hitchhiker's Guide". ---------------------------------------- 2.7 Dr Who and Douglas Adams Douglas (co)authored the shows "City of Death", "The Pirate Planet" and "Shada". Shada was never screened. City of Death and Shada were worked over and became "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency". He also wrote a treatment (plot synopsis) for a film called "Dr Who and the Krikkitmen". It was never made into either a film or a TV show, but most of the pertinent plot points reappeared in "Life, The Universe and Everything." "Shada" was finally released on video on 6/6/1992. [Order info?] ---------------------------------------- 3 Douglas Adams and Computers DNA definitely has a close association with computers. Here you will find about his love for Macintoshes, computer games he has (and hasn't) written, and computer magazine articles he has authored. ---------------------------------------- 3.1 Macintoshes Douglas Adams likes Macintoshes, and at one stage lived with one in Islington (see the dedication to [?]). He says that computer have completely changed the way he writes (he has gone from avoiding writing by finding food to eat, to avoiding writing by reconfiguring his Macintosh's operating system). ---------------------------------------- 3.2 Computer Games With Infocom's Steve Meretzky (who no longer works for Infocom after their takeover by Mediagenic), he wrote "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" adventure game. "Bureaucracy" was credited to "Douglas Adams and The Staff of Infocom" - there were lots of Infocom people involved (Jeff O'Neill, Dave Lebling, Fred Morgan and others). The end sequence to the game "Hitchhiker's Guide" mentions a second game called "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe", but this game doesn't exist. Douglas Adams started to write it, as because "Bureaucracy" had poor sales, Adams and Infocom dropped the project. Infocom tried to revive the project later, but the virtual death of Infocom in 1990 brought this idea to an end. Douglas Adams also started work on another game, where the emphasis was to be on creating a virtual reality in the adventure, but petered out after his partner lost interest. Meretzky is still writing computer adventure games for "Legend Entertainment". Infocom only exists as a label for Activision, the company having been closed in 1989. The games are available from Virgin Mastertronic in "Infocom From Mastertonic" (a budget games house in the UK). Their address is : Customer Services Virgin Mastertronic Ltd 16 Portland Road London W11 2LA Tel: 071 - 727 8070 It is also included in a package of 20 games called "The Lost Treasures of Infocom", released by Activision. "Bureaucracy" is available in "The Lost Treasures of Infocom II", also by Activision. These packages should be orderable or purchasable from any decent computer store :-) ---------------------------------------- 3.3 Magazine Articles A Review of Microsoft Word for the Macintosh [?] MacUser Magazine September 1987 Page 144. The Woes of SCSI Chaining Personal Macintosh column MacUser Magazine [when?] ---------------------------------------- 3.4 CD-ROM Edition of "Last Chance to See" See section 4.5 ---------------------------------------- 4 Mechandising There are lots of merchandised products around. Here you fill find where to order the cassette tapes, albums, CDs and video from. ---------------------------------------- 4.1 Audio Tapes The canonical address is: BBC World Service Mail Order Room LG26 NE Bush House Strand London WC2B 4PH Tel: +44 71 257 2575 Fax: +44 71 497 0498 The price, for a box set of 6 audio tapes is #21.70 (British pounds). ---------------------------------------- 4.2 Albums In the autumn of 1979, a double record album was released, which was a slightly contracted version of the first four episodes of the radio series. These were new recordings of essentially the same scripts. In the autumn of 1980, a second album was made, consisting of a rewritten and expanded version of radio episodes 5 and 6. This was called _The Restaurant at the End of the Universe_. You can obtain the albums from: Intergalactic Trading Co. P.O. Box 1516 Longwood, FL 32750 (407) 831-8344 their catalog is $2, and the albums cost $10 ($5 each). ---------------------------------------- 4.3 CDs The canonical address is: BBC World Service Mail Order Room LG26 NE Bush House Strand London WC2B 4PH Tel: +44 71 257 2575 Fax: +44 71 497 0498 The price, for a box set of 6 CDs is #34.76 (British pounds). ---------------------------------------- 4.4 Videos [?] ---------------------------------------- 4.5 CD-ROM Edition of "Last Chance to See" Featuring Douglas Adams reading the voice, information on the animals by Mark Carwardine, numerous photographs. Available for the Mac only. [Order info?] ---------------------------------------- 4.5 The Order of Everything 1978: Fits 1-6 of the radio series were aired. : Fit 7 (The Christmas Episode) aired. 1979: Pan Books releases "The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" book in Britain (expanded Fits 1-4). : Double album released (contracted Fits 1-4). 1980: Fits 8-12 of the radio series were aired. : Pan Books releases "Restaurant at the End of the Universe" in Britain (contracted Fits 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 5 and 6). : Harmony Books releases the first book in the United States. : Second record album recorded (expanded Fits 5 and 6). 1981: Six television episodes aired by the BBC, based on Fits 1-6 (used revisions made in the books). 1982: Harmony Books releases the second book in the United States. 1982: "Life the Universe and Everything" released simultaneously in Britain and the United States. 1984: "So Long, And Thanks for All the Fish" released simultaneously in Britain and the United States. 1986: "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" computer game released. 199?: "Last Chance to See" released. 199?: "Last Chance to See" CD-ROM released. 1992: "Mostly Harmless" released. ---------------------------------------- 5 Explanations Not all of DNA's writing is easily grasped. This section includes explanations of some of the trickier sections. ---------------------------------------- 5.1 The Ending to "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" From: bhack@mundil.cs.mu.OZ.AU (Brendan Hack) Date: Tue, 12 Nov 1991 23:08:13 GMT First of all you need to know something about Coleridge. There was never a second part of the poem _Kubla Khan_. Yet, at the end of Chapter 6 when The Director Of English Studies is reading _Kubla Khan_ the book says `The voice (that of the director of english studies) continues, reading the second, and altogether strange part of the poem.' In the book, _Kubla Khan_ has a second part. The book is not actually set in our existence. It is set in an existence in which the second part of _Kubla Khan_ exists. This second part of the poem tells the ghost about the existence of the time machine and how to travel back and stop the ship from exploding. As we well know the explosion of the ship is what caused life to begin on this miserable little planet of ours. When Dirk and Reg realised this they simply went forward in time to when Coleridge was writing the second part of _Kubla Khan_ and stopped him. Dirk just interrupted him and talked so much that Coleridge forgot what the second part was going to be about and therefore could not finish it! This change of history sent reality back into our perspective and the human race lived on (Yay, yippee!). Quite simple really. ---------------------------------------- 5.2 Young Zaphod Plays It Safe [?] ---------------------------------------- 6 Miscellaneous This section has stuff that didn't really fit anywhere else. ---------------------------------------- 6.1 Stuff The phrase "the long dark teatime of the soul" appears in Chapter 1 of "Life, The Universe and Everything". Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged is described as being eventually ground down by the Sunday afternoons, and "as you stare at the clock the hands will move relentlessly on to four o'clock, and you will enter the long dark teatime of the soul." If you ring the Islington telephone number, you will get some people who have nothing to do with Douglas Adams and who are very annoyed. Don't do it. Arthur plays Dire Straits' "Tunnel of Love" from their "Making Movies" album to Fenchurch, in "So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish". ---------------------------------------- 6.2 Number Games Yes, 6 times 9 equals 54. Yes, 6 times 9 equals 42 in base thirteen, and we don't want to know about the implications for the number of fingers on cavemen. The bit about monkeys was a reference to someone's comment that if you get an infinite number of monkeys at typewriters, eventually one will bash out a script to Hamlet. If you want to discuss probability, quantum physics or anything else that has nothing to do with Douglas Adams, bugger off to another group. ---------------------------------------- 6.3 Other Authors If you like Douglas Adams' writing, you might appreciate books by: * Neil Gaiman * Terry Pratchett * Tom Sharpe * P J O'Rourke * P G Wodehouse * Tom Holt ... but I offer no guarantees. ---------------------------------------- 6.4 The Future Having just released "Mostly Harmless", Douglas Adams says he wants to do a TV series about the Universe and the stuff in it. He estimates this will run around 12 episodes in length. There is a video called "The Making of the Hitchhiker's Guide" in progress, featuring all the original actors. They even found Marvin's costume in a box in the BBC. ---------------------------------------- 6.5 Related Electronic Information PGG (Project Galactic Guide for long) accepts entries on real-life subjects, as well as unreal-life subjects. A reader for the guide is available, as vela.acs.oakland.edu:/pub/swbaker/guide.zip Don't forget binary mode, ftp outside of business hours and contact swbaker@vela.acs.oakland.edu if you have any questions. Check out the newsgroup alt.galactic-guide, where PGG is alleged to be happening. The person to contact is the Editor-In-Chief, Supreme-God-Over-All-Beings and Leader-of-The-Hack, Paul Clegg (cleggp@aix.rpi.edu). After long and protracted discussions on which format is best for this, a decision was reached and I wasn't interested enough to record it for posterity. Contact Paul for information. There is also a paper-based list, maintained by David Hodges. It is used to raise money for charity and has been approved by Douglas Adams. You can buy copies (for charity), it is very large, and would be tremendously illegal (and most would find it immoral) to put on the net. Contributions to this can be sent to alm@doc.ic.ac.uk (remember to say they're for David Hodges as this isn't his account). ----------------------------------------