Douglas Adams > Quotes

“You just let the machines get on with the adding up,” warned Majikthise, “and we’ll take care of the eternal verities, thank you very much. You want to check your legal position, you do, mate. Under law the Quest for Ultimate Truth is quite clearly the inalienable prerogative of your working thinkers. Any bloody machine goes and actually finds it and we’re straight out of a job, aren’t we? I mean, what’s the use of our sitting up half the night arguing that there may or may not be a God if this machine only goes and gives you his bleeding phone number the next morning?”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“There is no problem about changing the course of history—the course of history does not change because it all fits together like a jigsaw. All the important changes have happened before the things they were supposed to change and it all sorts itself out in the end. The”
― Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

“Earthman, the planet you lived on was commissioned, paid for and run by mice. It was destroyed five minutes before the completion of the purpose for which it was built, and we’ve got to build another one.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“The major problem – one of the major problems, for there are several – one of the many major problems with governing people is that of who you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them. To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem. And”
― Douglas Adams, The Complete Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Trilogy of Five

“Noch sind wir zwar keine gefährdete Art, aber es ist nicht so, daß wir nicht oft genug versucht hätten, eine zu werden.”
― Douglas Adams

“Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“Arthur sat at the bar and rested. He was used to not knowing what was going on. He felt comfortable with it.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Omnibus: A Trilogy of Five

“Tief im Regenwald tat es das, was es im Regenwald normalerweise tut, nämlich regnen: daher der Name.”
― Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

“Well, you’re obviously being totally naive, of course,’ said the girl. ‘When you’ve been in marketing as long as I have you’ll know that before any new product can be developed it has to be properly researched. We’ve got to find out what people want from fire, how they relate to it, what sort of image it has for them.”
― Douglas Adams, The Complete Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Trilogy of Five

“Indeed, Bill, it is. You find me thriving. And Mrs Roberts? How is she? Foot still troubling her?” “Not since she had it off, thanks for asking, sir. Between you and me, sir, I would’ve been just as happy to have had her amputated and kept the foot. I had a little spot reserved on the mantelpiece, but there we are, we have to take things as we find them.”
― Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency Box Set: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency and The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

“He was following the Earth through its days, drifting with the rhythms of its myriad pulses, seeping through the webs of its life, swelling with its tides, turning with its weight.”
― Douglas Adams

“Are you trying to tell me,” said Arthur, slowly and with control, “that you originally . . . made the Earth?”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“Now Arthur knew this dog, and he knew it well. It belonged to an advertising friend of his, and was called Know-Nothing-Bozo the Non-Wonder Dog because the way its hair stood up on its head reminded people of the President of the United States of America,”
― Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“Now I lay me down to sleep, Try to count electric sheep. Sweet dream wishes you can keep, How I hate the night.”
― Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“The very worst poetry of all perished along with its creator Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings of Greenbridge, Essex, England in the destruction of the planet Earth.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“The argument goes something like this: 'I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, 'for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.'
'But,' says Man, 'The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED.'
'Oh dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanished in a puff of logic.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“Out,” he said. People who can supply that amount of firepower don’t need to supply verbs as well. Ford and Arthur went out, closely followed by the wrong end of the Kill-O-Zap gun and the buttons. Turning”
― Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

“It is most gratifying that your enthusiasm for our planet continues unabated. As a token of our appreciation, we hope you will enjoy the two thermonuclear missiles we've just sent to converge with your craft. To ensure ongoing quality of service, your death may be monitored for training purposes. Thank you.”
― Douglas Adams

“The sky which had started out with such verve and spirit in the morning was beginning to lose its concentration and slip back into its normal English condition, that of a damp and rancid dishcloth.”
― Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

“The great ships hung motionless in the sky, over every nation on Earth. Motionless they hung, huge, heavy, steady in the sky, a blasphemy against nature. Many people went straight into shock as their minds tried to encompass what they were looking at. The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don’t. And still nothing happened. Then there was a slight whisper, a sudden spacious whisper of open ambient sound. Every hi-fi set in the world, every radio, every television, every cassette recorder, every woofer, every tweeter, every mid-range driver in the world quietly turned itself on. Every tin can, every dustbin, every window, every car, every wineglass, every sheet of rusty metal became activated as an acoustically perfect sounding board. Before the Earth passed away it was going to be treated to the very ultimate in sound reproduction, the greatest public address system ever built. But there was no concert, no music, no fanfare, just a simple message. “People of Earth, your attention, please,” a voice said, and it was wonderful. Wonderful perfect quadraphonic sound with distortion levels so low as to make a brave man weep. “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.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“Plenty of people didn't care for him much, but there is a huge difference between disliking somebody - maybe even disliking them a lot - and actually shooting them, strangling them, dragging them through the fields and setting their house on fire. It was a difference which kept the vast majority of the population alive from day to day.”
― Douglas Adams

“Ich kriege schon Kopfschmerzen, wenn ich bloß versuche mich auf euer Niveau runterzudenken.”
― Douglas Adams, Per Anhalter durch die Galaxis/Das Restaurant am Ende des Universums

“His name was Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged. He was a man with a purpose. Not a very good purpose, as he would have been the first to admit, but it was at least a purpose and it did keep him on the move.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Quandary Phase

“He smiled the smile that Zaphod had wanted to hit and this time Zaphod hit it.”
― Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: A Trilogy of Five

“His mouth started to speak, but his brain decided it hadn’t got anything to say yet and shut it again. His brain then started to contend with the problem of what his eyes told it they were looking at, but in doing so relinquished control of the mouth which promptly fell open again. Once more gathering up the jaw, his brain lost control of his left hand which then wandered around in an aimless fashion.”
― Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“Come off it, Mr. Dent,” he said, “you can’t win, you know. You can’t lie in front of the bulldozer indefinitely.” He tried to make his eyes blaze fiercely but”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“As you gazed into the polished surface of the marble the vague forms of instruments became visible, and as you touched them the instruments materialized instantly under your hands. Looked at from the correct angles the mirrors appeared to reflect all the required data read-outs, though it was far from clear where they were reflected from.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“With an amazingly balletic movement Zaphod was standing and scanning the horizon, because that was how far the gold ground stretched in every direction, perfectly smooth and solid. It gleamed like … it’s impossible to say what it gleamed like because nothing in the Universe gleams in quite the same way that a planet made of solid gold does.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

“When it’s fall in New York, the air smells as if someone’s been frying goats in it, and if you are keen to breathe, the best plan is to open a window and stick your head in a building.”
― Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless

“My God, they are! They’re knocking my house down. What the hell am I doing in the pub, Ford?” “It hardly makes any difference at this stage,” said Ford, “let them have their fun.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy