Bir haftada bitiririm umuduyla başlayıp iki ayda bitirmem, ikinci kitabın hayal kırıklığına uğratması ve üçüncü kitabın gereksiz olduğunu düşünmem dışında güzeldi. Güzel yapan en büyük etken de Ford Prefect karakteriydi tabi.

otostopçunun galaksi rehberi: 5/5
evrenin sonundaki restoran: 3/5
hayat, evren ve her şey: 2/5
elveda ve bütün o balıklar için teşekkürler: 5/5
çoğunlukla zararsız: 4/5

Ovaj Marvin je legenda!!! :D
Prva dva dela su maestralno napisana,preostali delovi razvučeni i za nijansu slabiji,ali to mi nije pokvarilo celokupan utisak o ovom romanu.
Jedna od knjiga kojoj ću se nanovo vraćati :)

Misafir, tatil hazırlıkları, tatil derken nihayet bitirdim.

ilk başta bilim kurgu okumak bana göre değil diye düşünmüştüm ama ilerledikçe keyif almaya başladım. Arthur Dent kendimden çok şeyler bulduğum karakter ve Marvin, sevgili hüzünbaz robot.

Eğlenceliydi. :)

This was a super fun ride. I wasn't a huge fan of the first book when I originally read it. But I am glad I finally went back and read the whole thing.

So, listen to the audiobooks because they are so funny.

So Earth's destroyed, and some weird English man and woman go to space with some weird aliens and robots, none very bright but ridiculous.

“I'm a scientist and I know what constitutes proof. But the reason I call myself by my childhood name is to remind myself that a scientist must also be absolutely like a child. If he sees a thing, he must say that he sees it, whether it was what he thought he was going to see or not. See first, think later, then test. But always see first. Otherwise you will only see what you were expecting. Most scientists forget that.”

The first three books remain amazingly silly. So Long was on rereading a little thin. Mostly Harmless was only partly a return to form. I think Life... might be my favorite at least partly because it introduces Wowbagger.

Classica trilogia in cinque parti (e appendice). A tratti irresistibile, con trovate geniali e esilaranti, è però inadatta ad una lettura "tutta d'un fiato": avendone già letti i primi volumi, ho voluto gustarmi l'intera saga, e devo ammettere che qualche momento di stanca c'è stato (e l'appendice non è agli standard di Adams).

Inquietante, ad ogni modo, la preveggenza dell'Autore (come spesso nella sci-fi): la Guida, in fondo, è un moderno notebook con accesso a Wikipedia...

In questi libri non si trova solo la risposta alla vita, l'universo e tutto, ma anche una delle migliori analisi politologiche di sempre:

"Il maggior problema, ossia uno dei maggiori problemi (ce ne sono tanti) che l'idea di governo fa sorgere è questo: chi è giusto che governi? O meglio, chi è così bravo da indurre la gente a farsi governare da lui?
A ben analizzare, si vedrà che: a) chi più di ogni altra cosa desidera governare la gente è, proprio per questo motivo, il meno adatto a governarla; b) di conseguenza, a chiunque riesca di farsi eleggere Presidente dovrebbe essere proibito di svolgere le funzioni proprie della sua carica, per cui; c) la gente e il suo bisogno di essere governata sono una gran rogna."

Edit 11/17/2017: Added mini-review of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.
Edit 4/18/19: Added mini-review of Life, the Universe and Everything.
Edit 7/19/19: Added mini-review of So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish.
Edit 11/5/21: All done!

2013: I don't think I've ever gotten all the way through this five-books-plus-a-short-story trilogy but it still remains fond in memory as part of my British sci-fi TV phase in high school that also included Dr. Who and Blake's 7. (A good looking actor or two, and the scripts, had about equal influence on teenager-me's interest level.)

*

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: it has to have been since I was in high school that I read this one, since I would have recognized the Monty Python nods that pop up here and there from hanging out with nerds through college and beyond. Our universe here has a white maleness about it, but calling that out feels ungracious in the face of something that still made me laugh, even after having been through the story many times over the years in TV, book, and movie form.

*

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe:

Already we're moving on to parts of the series that I don't have nearly memorized. All I specifically remembered from this was the scene with the Dish of the Day, but bits and pieces of it came back as I went along.

This second novel finishes, sort of, the story started in the first book, giving us the ultimate question that is answered by the ultimate answer. Or does it?

Structure-wise it's a series of set pieces connected with huge jumps through time and space. My favorite part is where Zaphod meets the ruler of the Universe, who has an existentialist point of view so extreme that it becomes absurd. But all the sequences are striking in their own way. It has a somewhat relaxed and conceptual vibe, not as hectic or humorous as Hitchhiker's. Maybe some of that is because Arthur's become more accustomed to his life as a galactic wanderer and isn't freaking out all the time.

Restaurant ended rather abruptly: I was clicking away through my Kindle copy, and boom. If I'd been reading a paper copy, obviously I wouldn't have been surprised by it! That said, it would be a reasonable end to a duology, if we didn't all know the series went on for three more books. :)

I read this because one of the lines from the first book came to mind in a political discussion. Unsurprising, really. What sometimes surprises me, though, is how much these books are consolatory reading for me, despite their essential cynicism. In the face of events you can't control--and the characters witness and go through quite a lot of them--you have to keep on keepin' on.

*

Life, the Universe and Everything:

I'd read this novel only once over thirty years ago, and it was surprising how much of it I remembered, from the S.E.P. field to the immortal who travels the universe insulting everyone--literally everyone--in alphabetical order.

Adams himself admitted that he was a reluctant novelist who preferred to work in other media, and in this third volume, well, it's starting to show. Adams' wonderful talent for funny set pieces remains, but those set pieces have to share the stage with a not terribly interesting "save the Universe" plot (that apparently was, itself, imported from a scrapped other project), which makes parts of this story mildly boring to get through.

There are a couple of points where the reader can ponder serious questions like military escalation or how any given life sustains itself at the expense of other lives... but they certainly don't have to. This a quick and mostly entertaining read, and while it isn't the best of the lot by far, for me it was worth its brief time investment to see Arthur, Marvin and the rest again. This volume ends with Arthur being separated from the others, much as he was at the end of the second book. But with two volumes left to go, you know it won't be long before we're back to seeing the wildest corners of the universe through his goggling shocked eyes.

*

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish:

Well, what to say about this one. There are a couple of really good parts, the last few chapters being a standout. But more than half of the book is taken up with Arthur Dent falling in love.

It goes like this: Arthur first meets--or rather, sees, under circumstances that are on the "Yikes!" side--a woman named Fenchurch. They are separated by coincidence, and meet again through coincidence (neither of which coincidence involves the Heart of Gold, apparently). They are immediately infatuated and have a lot of sex.

That isn't a romance. It isn't even a story! And it eats up dozens of fairly boring pages. The story about the biscuits within the Arthur-Fenchurch hookup arc is much better than it is.

And then when Ford and Arthur meet again, Fenchurch fades entirely into the background. [goes off to ship Ford and Arthur]

Zaphod and Trillian are mentioned in passing, and Marvin makes a final (?) appearance, but anyone expecting a reunion of the gang is up for a disappointment.

It's hard to say what I'd think about this one if my mind hadn't been dazzled with the first two books. I can completely understand an author not wanting to write the same book over and over, and this one's different, all right, but it also largely fails to be either funny or thoughtful. There's a feeling of "if I must" about it, and Adams' reluctance to grind out more of these incredibly popular books hangs over the whole thing.

*

"Young Zaphod Plays It Safe": an elaborate, nicely-presented setup for a mid-'80s-topical punch line.

*

Mostly Harmless:

Wow, that was unexpected. It's a downer a lot of the time, and extremely unpleasant once or twice. I'll give this one a better write-up in its own review. (edit to add: the review is here.)

*

This "trilogy" is never the same thing twice, and that's all to the good. Some books work better than others; the third and fourth are skippable aside from a handful of passages, in my opinion. On the whole it's well worth a read, if you're of a certain age and/or have an affinity for British pop media of a couple of generations ago. I don't think Adams' imagination and novels... or at least, the discipline that goes into creating novels... were aligned all that well. But I am grateful that these, and the Dirk Gently novels, exist as a legacy of that imagination, both in its youthful exuberance, and in its later weary nihilism.

This could possibly be one of the most epic books of all time, easily passing up the biography of Chuck Norris and the complete works of J.K. Rowling. I have read all 5 books at least 8 times over and can pretty much recite the first chapter of the first book from memory. At night i fall asleep to the gentle sounds of Stephen Fry reading The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy from my AM/FM 2 disc CD/cassette radio player box.
Though you can start with any of the five books, i wouldn't suggest starting with any one but the first, otherwise your head has a tendency to explode. The story starts out in the quiet rather boring life of one Arthur Dent. Upon getting up one morning, he finds that there are several rather large and yellowish bulldozers preparing to destroy his home. He is somewhat angry about this and makes the most logical choice to go lay down in front of one to stall for time. Things go badly for him, and, a couple hours later, the Earth gets vaporized in a brutal sort of way by a rather nasty group of slug-things called Vogons. Luckily, Arthur has the brains to be chummy with Ford Prefect... who just so happens to be an alien hitchhiker from the planet Betelgeuse. Ford uses a fancy ring to hitch a ride on the nearest Vogon ship just seconds before ole' Earth kicks the bucket.
Throughout the next four installments of the series, Ford Prefect and Arthur journey through the universe visiting such places as Magrothea, a nifty little planet where they make custom order worlds for rich people. Another exciting place they journey to is the odorous world of Vogsphere. Bad luck befalls the duo, and they are almost fed to the Ravenous Bug-Blatter Beast of Traal. On a brighter note, they manage to kill a jeweled crab with the door of a spaceship. They are supported by a colorful class of characters including the two-headed, charismatic President of the Universe, Zaphod Beeblebrox, and his (from what im told) pretty sexy girlfriend, Trillian.
I would suggest this book to anyone and everyone. However, a sense of humour is required. Without it, you will undoubtedly be as lost as Willy Wonka is in a nutritional foods store. There are some groups however that should not read this work of excellence even if they have a sense of humour. They include, but are not limited to, animals, seeing as how the absence of opposible thumbs might make it difficult for them to turn the pages, and PETA, because they will be angry that animals were not given equal rights as humans in this review.

Prilično sam sigurna da je ovo, za sada, jedina knjiga prilikom čijeg čitanja sam morala da napravim nekoliko meseci pauze zarad vlastitog dobra, što se ispostavio kao dobar potez.

Apsurd kojim ovih pet priča obiluje je inicijator fantastičnog humora i u više navrata sam se nasmejala glasnije nego što bih smela da priznam. Takođe, ne mogu a da se ne sažalim na sirotog Artura Denta koji mi je momentalno prirastao srcu uz još sirotijeg Marvina. Razlog za pomenutu pauzu tokom čitanja leži u neverovatnom broju obrta u pričama koji se za trenutak graniči sa besmislom i predstavlja noćnu moru bilo kome sa iole slabijom koncentracijom.

Sa druge strane, ni sama nisam bila svesna odličnih fazona koji su u opštoj upotrebi godinama unazad, a za koje nisam imala pojma da potiču baš iz Autostoperskog vodiča kroz galaksiju. Prema prvoj priči je snimljen i film, pa ko voli, nek' izvoli :) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0371724/

In my opinion, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is the best in the series. I can only imagine what it must have been like to read a first-edition of the novel when it was originally published back in 1979, or to have listened to the original radio broadcast even earlier. The story was highly original, zany (sometimes even incomprehensibly silly), the characters lovable and bizarre at the same time, and the concept...out-of-this-world original. I mean, the creator of Vogons (and their poetry!) ought to get a 5-star rating all the time, every time.

Unfortunately, I do not have the same endearing feelings for the subsequent books - The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish, and my least-favorite, Mostly Harmless. As a radio/TV concept, the material for stories seems endless. But I don't know, that longevity didn't work for me in novel format.

So while I love having an omnibus copy of all the books in the series (loving this larger, more compact edition more than the single-volume Hitchhiker's...), I still prefer the first story to the others in the series.

And now...a poem I wrote!

See, see the Type-A sky
Marvel at its big turquoise depths.
Tell me, Bertha do you
Wonder why the monkey ignores you?
Why its foobly stare
makes you feel irritable.
I can tell you, it is
Worried by your wackity facial growth
That looks like
A pineapple.
What's more, it knows
Your snog potting shed
Smells of snail.
Everything under the big Type-A sky
Asks why, why do you even bother?
You only charm socks.

La mia avventura nello spazio è finita - per ora. Ho viaggiato su astronavi bellissime, superaccessoriate e di colori sgargianti. Mi è capitato anche di salire su di una completamente nera. Ho viaggiato attraverso milioni di anni luce. Ho incontrato gli alieni, tanti alieni, alcuni mi somigliavano anche. Ho attraversato diversi mondi paralleli - che poi tecnicamente non lo sono in realtà, paralleli. E ho visitato pianeti con le caratteristiche più disparate, ma nessuno è bello come la Terra - a parte forse Lamuella, per quanto abbia potuto rendermene conto da quel breve intervallo di vita che Arthur Dent ha speso laggiù.

Leggere Guida galattica per gli autostoppisti è tutto questo e molto di più. Al centro di tutto c'è un uomo abbastanza ordinario - Arthur Dent - la cui vita tranquilla viene sconvolta dal suo amico Ford Prefect che è un autostoppista galattico bloccato da quindici anni sul pianeta Terra.
E poi c'è l'incredibile e meravigliosa Guida, una sorta di libro digitale - oggi ci riesce immensamente più facile immaginarcelo a differenza di quaranta anni fa - sulla cui copertina si legge la scritta a caratteri cubitali NIENTE PANICO. Ecco, credo che una guida di questo genere possa essere utile anche nella vita di tutti i giorni. Anzi, forse non tanto la guida in sé, quanto la sua imponente scritta sulla copertina.

Douglas Adams regala al lettore delle perle di ilarità pura, motivo per cui durante la lettura capita di essere trascinati in un riso implacabile e spontaneo. Questo ciclo di romanzi è, dunque, uno svago perfetto. Offre un'ottima distrazione, ma chi riesce a leggere tra le righe troverà spunti di riflessione interessanti. Non mi sembra esagerato pensare che in questo libro sia presente l'idea del cercare di dare un senso alla vita e la conseguente realizzazione della precarietà della vita stessa.