The Great American Read

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Narrator

And every man on a fantastical journey is at the core of another favorite novel of yours, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, published in 1979. Like Swift, author Douglas Adams takes a sardonic view of contemporary society, but with an even more comedic twist. Through his hapless protagonist Arthur Dent, Adams takes on bureaucracy and closed mindedness. Gulliver's Travels and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy are two books in a long line of beautiful satire and join that whole host of people that make us laugh at not only ourselves, but laugh at people in power. It's essentially the story of Arthur Dent, the English everyman, he's kind of the guy that things just never really go well for him. His house was going to be bulldozed, but then it turns out that his planet got bulldozed instead. -

Narrator

This is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz of the Galactic Hyperspace Planning Council, the voice continued. As you will no doubt be aware, the plans for development of the outlying regions of the galaxy require the building of a hyperspatial express route through your star system, and regrettably, your planet is one of those scheduled for demolition. The process will take slightly less than two of your Earth minutes, thank you. Arthur Dent's best friend Ford Prefect, who's pretty much his only friend, is also an alien, who somehow hitchhikes a ride for them on a passing spaceship to get them away from the exploding planet, and he does this because he's a travel writer for the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which tells you where to go in the galaxy if you wanna have a good time. It's just an awkward, weird book. But I love that it is, and I love the idea of a character, Ford Prefect, named for a car, because he assumed they were the dominant life form on Earth. It's an absurdist, post modernist, hyper creative, not strictly logical, linear, way to create a story world. And Arthur goes out into space with Ford Prefect, and there's the fear of the unknown. It's the idea that I'm in this totally new environment, I have no reference points to understand what's going on around me, the point of the book is, what is Arthur Dent's reaction to all these things that are happening to him? And they're very human things that are happening to him. -

Narrator

The Hitchhiker's Guide was an instant hit when it came out in 1979, and helped popularize the phrase, don't panic. Take the words on the front of the Hitchhiker's Guide to heart, and don't panic, think about it. It's something that, as human beings, that's one of our greatest survival traits, is that adaptability, so take advantage of it. I'm Chris Kluwe, you should vote for Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, cause if you don't, I will show up to your house and recite Vogon poetry at you until you probably wanna jump out of an airli...