For this course I decided to read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy once more. I've read all of the five published books in the series and they are among my absolute favourites, but I only read the first one this time. The book is basicly a twisted science fiction story following a normal British man called Arthur Dent, which coincidently is friends with Ford Prefect, a writer for the company that publishes the guide. In the book, the guide is the ultimate encyclopedia of all things one would need to know about the universe. Arthur is of course not aware that Ford is an "alien", but he quickly realises that when Ford saves him from certain death when Earth is destroyed because a new space-highway needs to be built.
The thing that intrigued the most about the books, is the way that Douglas Adams (the writer) goes into excessive detail about seemingly pointless things just to amuse the reader. There is a part in the book where the main characters are on a spaceship that has a "improbability drive" and the ship is being chased by two thermal nuclear missiles. They engage the drive and the missiles turn into a sperm whale and a pot of petunias. Seeing as they are above a planet when the engage the drive, the whale and the pot of petunias start falling towards the ground and Adams spends several pages explaining what went trough the whale's and pot of petunias mind as they fall to certain death.
The book is filled with strange (borderline insane) parts where, I for one, thought Adams must have been drunk when he wrote it.
Throughout the whole series the reader follows Arthur, which has to face the fact that his planet has been destroyed, everyone he ever knew is dead and he constantly finds out new things about how everything works in the universe. He starts out as really depressed human being. His house is being demolished, he has no luck with love and he doesn't enjoy his life at all. It's quite a morbid experience for Arthur but, in fact, his planet being blown up is the best thing that ever happened to him. He finds joy in his life again and he evolves from a sad, depressed man to a man constantly seeking new adventures.
I think most people can relate to Arthur, in the sense that not all bad things generate more bad things. We've all had hardships in our lives but most of us manage to bring something positive from it. You can go through a bad breakup and of course it feels like everything's hopeless for a while, but you can pick yourself up and find a new relationship and not make the same mistake again. You've learned from that bad experience and in doing so improved your chances at succeeding with your current relationship.
In conclusion, even though the book is a science-fiction book and contains a lot of humour, there are quite a lot to learn from it if you consider the evolvement Arthur makes facing new and difficult situations.
