Douglas Adams
Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adamswas an English author, scriptwriter, essayist, humorist, satirist and dramatist...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth11 March 1952
animal average years
For millions of years, on average, one species became extinct every century.... We are now heaving more than a thousand different species of animals and plants off the planet every year.
amount average deranged divided follows infinite infinity known life meet merely near number people planets population products simply space time universe
It is known that there are an infinte 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. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near 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 products of a deranged imagination.
ford gave hollow learn malicious peace people together
Why can't people just learn to live together in peace and harmony?' said Arthur. / Ford gave a loud, very hollow laugh. / 'Forty-two!' he said with a malicious grin, 'No, doesn't work. Never mind.
anybody assumed everybody kid knew seen sure wide
I was the only kid who anybody I knew has ever seen actually walk into a lamppost with his eyes wide open. Everybody assumed that there must be something going on inside, because there sure as hell wasn't anything going on on the outside!
jobs knowing use
Being literate as a writer is good craft, is knowing your job, is knowing how to use your tools properly and not to damage the tools as you use them.
thinking giving want
If I want to read something that's really giving me something serious and fundamental to think about, about the human condition, if you like, or what we're all doing here, or what's going on, then I'd rather read something by a scientist in the life sciences, like Richard Dawkins, for instance.
writing sitting artistic
There's nothing worse than sitting down to write a novel and saying, "Well, okay, I'm going to do something of high artistic worth." It's funny.
fun player computer
You turn the computer into the storyteller and the player into the audience, like in the old days when the storyteller would actually respond to the audience, rather than just having the audience respond to the storyteller. I had an enormous amount of fun, actually, working on that.
art thinking suspicious
I tend to get very suspicious of anything that thinks it's art while it's being created.
sacrifice thinking self
What was the self-sacrifice?" I jettisoned half of a much-loved and I think irreplaceable pair of shoes." Why was that self-sacrifice?" Because they were mine!" said Ford, crossly. I think we have different value systems." Well mine's better.
divinity likes shapes
Nobody likes a whistler, particularly not the divinity that shapes our ends.
art opportunity simple
There is an art to the business of making sandwiches which it is given to few ever to find the time to explore in depth. It is a simple task, but the opportunities for satisfaction are many and profound.
car ballet toasters
The available worlds looked pretty grim. They had little to offer him because he had little to offer them. He had been extremely chastened to realize that although he originally came from a world which had cars and computers and ballet and Armagnac, he didn't, by himself, know how any of it worked. He couldn't do it. Left to his own devices he couldn't build a toaster. He could just about make a sandwich and that was it.
universe
And so the Universe ended.