The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Chapter-by-chapter summary of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Spoiler warning: this section covers the whole plot, including the ending.

Part 1: Earth goes first

Arthur Dent wakes in a quiet English town to find bulldozers outside his house. The council wants a bypass, and Arthur lies down in the mud to stop them. His friend Ford Prefect turns up, gets the council man to take Arthur's place in the mud, and marches Arthur to the pub. There Ford confesses that he is an alien from a small planet near Betelgeuse, stuck on Earth for fifteen years while researching it for a travel guide. Today, he says, the planet ends. Yellow ships arrive, and their Vogon crews explain that Earth is being demolished for a hyperspace bypass. The notice, they add, has been on show in a planning office on Alpha Centauri for fifty years. Why it matters: one man's grief over a house is swallowed by something so much bigger that the joke and the tragedy become the same thing.

Part 2: Thrown off the Vogon ship

Ford signals a passing Vogon ship with a small gadget, and the two of them are lifted aboard just before Earth vanishes. The Vogons are bureaucrats who care about nobody. Ford puts a Babel fish in Arthur's ear, a tiny creature that translates any language, so Arthur can understand the guards. Captain Jeltz then reads out his own poetry, which is terrible. When the two prisoners fail to praise it, he has them thrown out of the airlock. Why it matters: the Vogons are the book's favourite target, power that is slow, dull and impossible to argue with.

Part 3: Rescued by improbability

With seconds of air left, Ford and Arthur are saved by the unlikeliest rescue imaginable. The ship that picks them up is the Heart of Gold, a brand-new starship driven by the Infinite Improbability Drive, which makes impossible things happen by making them briefly likely. On board are Zaphod Beeblebrox, a distant cousin of Ford and the President of the Galaxy, who has two heads; Trillian, a woman Arthur once met at a party; and Marvin, a robot with a brain the size of a planet and a miserable outlook. Why it matters: the drive turns chance itself into a comic engine.

Part 4: The legendary planet

Zaphod admits that he stole the ship on purpose, but he cannot say why, because he wiped part of his own memory. He is looking for Magrathea, a legendary planet that once built other planets for the very rich. When the Heart of Gold arrives, two missiles are fired at it. The improbability drive turns them into a sperm whale and a bowl of petunias, and both fall toward the surface. The whale has just enough time to wonder who it is and why it is there. On the silent planet, Arthur meets an old man named Slartibartfast. Why it matters: disaster is handled as a joke, and the sad little thoughts of the whale give the scene an odd tenderness.

Part 5: The answer is forty-two

Slartibartfast leads Arthur into the planet's factory and tells him the history of the biggest question of all. Long ago, hyperintelligent beings from many dimensions built the giant computer Deep Thought to find the Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything. After seven and a half million years it announced the answer: forty-two. Nobody had known what the question was, so Deep Thought designed a still greater computer to find it. That computer was Earth, ordered from and built by Slartibartfast's people. It ran for ten million years and was destroyed five minutes before it finished. Why it matters: it is the book's best-known joke, that an answer is useless without the right question.

Part 6: The mice and the escape

Arthur learns that the beings who ordered Earth appear on it as laboratory mice, and that Trillian's white mice are among them. They believe the lost question may still be stored in the brain of Arthur, the last native of Earth who is still alive, and they offer to buy it. Arthur refuses. In the middle of the argument, Magrathean police arrive and open fire, and the group escapes in the Heart of Gold. The question is still unknown, and they decide to go for dinner at the end of the universe. Why it matters: humans thought they were the point, and the book gently suggests they were the experiment.

Characters

Arthur Dent

An ordinary Englishman who is still in his dressing gown when the universe turns up. He is the reader's stand-in: confused, polite, homesick and always wanting a cup of tea. His common sense is often useless in space, but it never leaves him.

Ford Prefect

A researcher for the Guide from a small planet near Betelgeuse. After fifteen years stranded on Earth he shortened the planet's entry to “Mostly harmless”. Cheerful, resourceful and slightly irresponsible, he is Arthur's guide to everything.

Zaphod Beeblebrox

The President of the Imperial Galactic Government, a showman with two heads. He stole the Heart of Gold at its launch, but he cannot explain why, since he deliberately blocked his own memory. Reckless, charming and hard to take seriously.

Trillian

Born Tricia McMillan on Earth, she studied maths and astrophysics before leaving the planet with Zaphod after a party where she met Arthur. She is quick and calm, and she keeps the ship's problems in perspective. Her two pet white mice turn out to matter.

Marvin

A robot with a brain the size of a planet and nothing worthy to use it on. He is gloomy, politely rude and sure that every task is pointless. His complaints are among the funniest running jokes in the book.

Slartibartfast

An elderly designer from Magrathea who builds planets for a living. He is proud of having shaped the coastline of Norway and of the award he won for its fjords. He quietly tells Arthur what Earth was really for.

Captain Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz

Captain of the Vogon construction fleet, a hulking bureaucrat who follows orders without feeling. He writes poetry that is painful to hear and throws Arthur and Ford out of his airlock when they fail to praise it.

Deep Thought

A vast computer built by hyperintelligent beings to answer the ultimate question. It thinks for seven and a half million years and says the answer is forty-two. It then points out that the real trouble is that nobody knows the question.

The mice

The white mice of Earth's laboratories, Trillian's pets among them, are the many-dimensional beings who ordered the planet. They treat people as parts of an experiment, and they would like to have Arthur's brain.

The Guide

The in-story book that gives the novel its title: an electronic encyclopedia for travellers. It is often wrong, usually funny and more reassuring than a correct one would be. “Don't Panic” is printed on its cover in large friendly letters.

Writing about this book

A strong school essay on this novel does not retell the plot. It picks one scene or idea and asks why Adams made it funny. Good starting questions:

• Why is it funnier that Earth is demolished for a bypass than for a war? What is Adams saying about officials and plans?
• What does the answer “forty-two” show about the difference between an answer and an understanding?
• Arthur is the only ordinary person in the story. How does the author use him to guide the reader?
• Is “Don't Panic” advice, a joke, or both?

For structure, introduce your chosen scene in two or three sentences, explain what you felt and why, then connect it to something from your own life, such as a rule that made no sense or a plan that changed overnight. Finish by saying what you think the author wanted readers to take away. Quote sparingly, never more than a line, and put every idea in your own words.