Targets of Satire in The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

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Targets of Satire in The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Douglas Adams satirizes many targets in The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Adams came up with the idea for The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in a drunken haze in Germany while he was lying in a field with the stars spinning over him (Adams, Douglas 12) which explains the style of humor, and the satire in the novel, which does not appear to make sense at first, but eventually does. Adams almost forgot about his idea for the novel (Gaiman 7). The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy satirizes many targets, but especially government and religion.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy began as an idea that Adams had, believe it or not, hitchhiking through Europe (“Douglas Adams”). A friend loaned him a copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Europe, and Adams had the idea for a Hitchhiker’s Guide to everywhere. After that, lying in a field in Germany, his mind made the leap to a Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The radio broadcast of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy began in 1978, well before many of the ideas proposed in the novels were brought into reality, or even originated, barring the Hitchhiker’s Guide. As such, everything in the series is entirely random and, at least in contemporary eyes, entirely improbable (who, in that time, could even begin to imagine aliens who are actually friendly? Or that they all were almost the same as human society?), and that improbability forms the basis of the entire series. It allows for some scenarios that were just about impossible to happen, due to a device that Adams devised, the Improbability Drive, to make the improbable into the probable. These scenarios allowed for examination of institutio...

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... Galaxy. New York: Del Ray, 2002. 7-10. Print.

Gaydosik, Victoria. “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” Bloom’s Literature. Facts on File, Inc. Web. 22 Nov, 2013.

Hamilton, Geoff, and Brian Jones. “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” Bloom’s Literature. Facts on File, Inc. Web. 22 Nov, 2013.

Havey, Robert. “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Genre.” College of Literature, Science, and Arts. University of Michigan. Web. 13 Dec, 2013

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Dir. Garth Jennings. Perf. Martin Freeman, Mos Def, Zooey Deschanel. Buena Vista Pictures, 2005. Film.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Narr. Peter Jones. BBC Radio 4. 8 Mar, 1978. Radio.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. BBC Two. 5 Jan, 1981. Television.

Schlegal, Christian. Religion and Atheism in Douglas Adams’ “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” GRIN Verlag, 2007. Print.

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