Don’t Panic

I have read this book so many times. I’ve also listened to the audiobook quite a bit — when I was in middle school, I duped myself a copy from the library, and used to listen to it at night and fall asleep to it. As a result, I have massive amounts of it memorized, although I tend to remember some bits more than others (probably the parts at the beginnings of each tape). I haven’t listened to it or re-read it in a while though, so when I saw it as a free e-audiobook download from my library, I jumped back on it. It was as good as I remembered.

“Space is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.”

For those who haven’t read the book, watched any of the adaptations, listened to the radio broadcast or the audiobook (narrated fabulously by Stephen Fry), here’s your basic plot: Earthman Arthur Dent is forcibly removed from planet Earth (mere moments before its demolition) by his friend Ford Prefect, who turns out to be from Betelguese. They meet up with a chick named Trillian and the two-headed president of the galaxy, Zaphod Beeblebox, who have stolen a brand new spaceship called the Heart of Gold, which gets its power from its Improbability Drive — which makes some weird shit happen.

What struck me most about this book on my one-millionth experience with it, is nothing really happens. The major conflict/mystery is not so major, and we never really have any moments of: oh, what’s going to happen to our heroes now? But that really, really doesn’t matter, but the narration and dialogue is some of the funniest shit ever committed to paper. And no matter how many times you read it or listen it, it never loses its power.