ADAMS, Douglas (Noel)

(1952-)

   UK scriptwriter and novelist who worked 1978-80 as an editor on the DR WHO tv series; his two Doctor Who episodes, Shada and City of Death, have provided plot elements for more than one of his later novels, but have not themselves been novelized. He came to wide notice with his HITCH HIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY sequence, whose first incarnation was as two BBC RADIO series, the first in 1978, the second in 1980, totalling 12 parts in all, the last 2 scripted in collaboration with producer John Lloyd. Both series were assembled as The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Original Radio Scripts (coll 1985) ed Geoffrey Perkins; the scripts as published here were modified for subsequent radio performances, and were also released on record albums in a format different from any of the radio incarnations. The second and third full reworkings of the sequence - as a tv series and as the first two volumes of a series of novels - seem to have been put together more or less simultaneously, and, although there are some differences between the two, it would be difficult to assign priority to any one version of the long and episodic plot. In novel form, the sequence comprises The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1979; vt The Illustrated Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy 1994) The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1980), Life, the Universe and Everything (1982), So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (1984); and Mostly Harmless (1992). The first three volumes were assembled as The Hitchhiker's Trilogy (omni 1984 US), and the first four were assembled as The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy: A Trilogy in Four Parts (omni 1986; vt The Hitchhiker's Quartet 1986 US; rev with Young Zaphod Plays it Safe added vt The More than Complete Hitchhiker's Guide: Five Stories 1987 US). One basic premise frames the various episodes contained in the differing versions of the sequence, though volumes three and four of the novel sequence carry on into new territory, and volume five seems to terminate the entire sequence, with an effect of melancholia. A human-shaped ALIEN, on contract to revise the eponymous guide, has under the name Ford Prefect spent some time on Earth, where he befriends the protagonist of the series, Arthur Dent. On learning that Earth is to be demolished to make way for an interstellar bypass, Prefect escapes the doomed planet with Dent, and the two then hitch-hike around the Galaxy, undergoing various adventures. Various satirical points are made, and, as the sequence moves ahead into the final episodes, DA's underlying corrosiveness of wit becomes more and more prominent. Earth proves to have been constructed eons earlier as a COMPUTER whose task it is to solve the meaning of life; but its demolition, only seconds before the answer is due, puts paid to any hope that any meaning will be found. For the millions of fans who listened to the radio version, watched the tv episodes, and laughed through the first two volumes of the book sequence, volumes three and four must have seemed punitively unamused by the human condition; and in Mostly Harmless (1992), a late addition to the sequence, the darkness only increases. But a satirist's intrinsic failure to be amused by pain did, in retrospect, underlie the most ebullient earlier moments. A second sequence - Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (1987) and The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul (1988) - confirmed the dark bent of DA's talent. Though the tales inventively carry the eponymous detective through a wide range of sf experiences, this second series did not gain the extraordinary response of the first. In a sense that only time can test, it could be said that the Hitch Hiker's Guide has become folklore. Other works: The Meaning of Liff (1983; rev vt The Deeper Meaning of Liff 1990) with John Lloyd, humour; The Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book (anth 1986), ed (anon), charity fundraising book for Comic Relief; Last Chance to See (1991) with Mark Carwardine, nonfiction book promoting wildlife conservation, with text by DA to photographs by Carwardine; Doctor Who: The Scripts: Pirate Planet (1994), reprinting an old DR WHO script.

   About the author: Don't Panic: The Official Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy Companion (1988; rev 1993 with David K.Dickson) by Neil GAIMAN.

   See also: ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM IN SF; FANTASTIC VOYAGES; GAMES AND TOYS; GODS AND DEMONS; HUMOUR; MUSIC; MYTHOLOGY; ROBOTS; SATIRE; SPACE OPERA.