Douglas Adams

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Douglas Adams
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21 Quotations from Douglas Adams

Arcturan adj. 1979 D. Adams The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy xxv. 127 The Great Hyperlobic Omni-Cognate Neutron Wrangler could talk all four legs off an Arcturan MegaDonkey—but only I could persuade it to go for a walk afterwards.
Betelgeusean n. 2 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy v. 40 (footnote) Ford Prefect’s original name is only pronuncible in an obscure Betelgeusian dialect, now virtually extinct since the Great Collapsing Hrung Disaster of Gal./Sid./Year 03758 which wiped out all the old Praxibetel communities on Betelgeuse Seven.
Betelgeusean adj. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy vii. 60 ‘So... er, what happens next?’ asked Arthur. ‘Oh, er, well the hatchway in front of us will open automatically in a few moments and we will shoot out into deep space I expect and asphyxiate. If you take a lungfulof air with you you can last for up to thirty seconds of course...’ said Ford. He stuck his hands behind his back, raised his eyebrows and started to hum an old Betelgeusian battle hymn.
bug-eyed monster n. 1979 D. Adams Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1981) 50 Are you trying to tell me that…some green bug-eyed monster stuck his head out and said ‘Hi fellas, hop right in, I can take you as far as the Basingstoke roundabout’?
Centaurian n. 2 1985 D. Adams So Long, & Thanks For All the Fish i. 3 It had large characters printed on the side which read (to anyone who could decipher the Centaurian alphabet) DUTY-FREE MEGA-MARKET, PORT BRASTA, ALPHA CENTAURI.
dimension n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy 148 ‘Magrathea is a gateway back to our own dimension,’ put in Benjy.
earthman n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy 124 ‘Earthman,’ he said, ‘it is sometimes hard to follow your mode of speech. Remember I have been asleep inside this planet of Magrathea for five million years and know little of these early sixties sit coms of which you speak.’
Encyclopedia Galactica n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy 7 In many of the more relaxed civilizations on the Outer Eastern Rim of the Galaxy, the Hitchhiker’s Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopaedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate, it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper; and second, it has the words DON’T PANIC inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover.
ether radio n. [1980 D. Adams Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1981) vi. 37 I just heard on the sub-ether radio report. It said you were dead.]
flying saucer n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy i. 15 Ford wished that a flying saucer would arrive soon because he knew how to flag flying saucers down and get lifts from them. He knew how to see the Marvels of the Universe for less than thirty Altairian dollars a day. In fact, Ford Prefect was a roving researcher for that wholly remarkable book The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
hyperspatial adj. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy iii. 30 The plans for development of the outlying regions of the Galaxy require the building of a hyperspatial express route through your star system.
jet car n. 1992 D. Adams Mostly Harmless xvi. 189 Spaceships and jetcars and helipods crashed and exploded continuously around here, illuminating the night.
jump n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy vi. 49 ‘No, don’t move…you'd better be prepared for the jump into hyperspace. It’s unpleasantly like being drunk.’ ‘What’s so unpleasant about being drunk?’ ‘You ask a glass of water.’
jump v. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy vi. 48 Secondly, we are about to jump into hyperspace for the journey to Barnard’s Star.
planet-hopper n. 2 1980 D. Adams The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1981) xviii. 107 The star buggy was a small ship—a totally misnamed one in fact, because the one thing it couldn’t manage was interstellar distances. Basically it was a sporty planet hopper dolled up to look like something it wasn’t.
Sirian adj. 1980 D. Adams Restaurant at End of Universe (1982) vi. 46 Modern elevators are strange and complex entities. The ancient electric winch and ‘maximum-capacity-eight- persons’ jobs bear as much relation to a Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Happy Vertical People Transporter as a packet of mixed nuts does to the entire west wing of the Sirian State Mental Hospital.
space alien n. 1992 D. Adams Mostly Harmless 28 He believed in virtually everything else, though. ‘Probably them space aliens,’ he said, bending over and prodding at the edges of the small indentations with his stick.
space suit n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy iii. 25 He will automatically assume he is also in possession of a toothbrush,…space suit etc., etc.
sub-ether n. 1980 D. Adams Restaurant at End of Universe xxi. 122 Zaphod leaped across the cabin and switched frequencies on the sub-ether receiver before the next mind-pulverizing noise hit them.
teleport n. 1 1980 D. Adams Restaurant at End of Universe (1985) 166 He tossed a coin into the teleport and jiggled a switch on the lolling control panel. With a crackle and spit of light, the coin vanished. ‘That much of it works,’ said Ford, ‘however, there is no guidance system. A matter transference teleport without guidance programming could put you…well, anywhere.’
visiscreen n. 1979 D. Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy 79 She sighed and punched up a star map on the visiscreen so she could make it simple for him, whatever his reasons for wanting it to be that way.