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Douglas Adams Remembered By Those Who Knew Him
John "Widgett" Robinson writes "IGN FilmForce tapped a bunch of folks who knew and worked with Douglas Adams, asking them to share some stories of their time with the man himself. They've posted the results as an article that includes responses from Pythoner Terry Jones, author Neil Gaiman, actor Stephen Fry, Rutle Neil Innes, zoologist Mark Carwardine, and Monkee Michael Nesmith. I've never heard any of these stories before, so the thing winds up being a unique tribute to a very cool frood."
Yeah, I'd love to have a bunch of my friends get together to remember me after I'm gone...just in time to hype a major new Hollywood Blockbuster.
...by those who did not know him.
"So Doug,' he growled, 'We're gonna eat a little lunch, maybe take a few moments to go over the idea and the money - and then we're gonna talk about what kinda animal ya like to sleep with..."
who ever had this conversation.
The rock, the vulture, and the chain
I thought it was just a fake rumor on Slashdot!
Mmmm.. Donuts
You mean "froopy".
Clearly you do not know where your towel is.
I had the privelege to listen to Adams speak at a lunch in San Jose back in '96. He was a very engaging and entertaining speaker and was very approachable afterwards to just chat.
The mirror is here
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Without a doubt, the funniest, and shortest comment was:
(Mr. Chapman could not be reached in time for deadline)
I believe Mr. Adams would be laughing could he be reached for comment....
Endlessly readable, never forgettable. There was a guy who really knew where his towel was.
The Pythons have been making fun of his death since his passing in 1989, even to the extent of doing an entire TV special with his theoretical urn on the coffee table, spilling it out, in fact.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Yes, yes it is an attempt at humor.
A few years back, the surviving Python members got together on the Tonight Show (IIRC). It was the first time they had been together in years. One of them held an urn holding Chapman's ashes, saying that it really was all of them together again.
Then, not long into the interview, someone dropped the urn and the ashes spilled everywhere. The Python guys went nuts, cleaning it up (one pulled out a dusbuster, while someone else swept the ash under a rug) and then everyone realized it was a joke.
If only we could all be remembered like that.
or a perfect time to publish an article.
It's called cross-promotion, and companies that are completely unaffiliated "cash in" on it all the time. You see, because of the publicity and marketing driven by the movie, there is presently a market of people interested in facts about Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker's Guide, British Comedy, Old Science Fiction, and who knows what else.
Any editor worth his salt would consider running stories that capitalize on that interest. The interest is bigger than it was two years ago, and bigger than it will be in six months. It would be idiotic not to run stories like this if you have access to them. It's not "disingenious", people want to read about things like this right now!
Also a question of who inspired Ford Prefect, it wasn't Eric Idle (as I'd guessed, from his minor involvement with the Pythons) but a college roommate, whose name he didn't give.
There's my minor nuggets.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Douglas Adams Remembered By Those Who Knew Him
Of course. He's not going to be remembered by those who knew nothing about him.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
I saw Douglas Adams speak at Cambell Hall at UCSB a couple weeks before he died. He was a very friendly, funny guy who believed in embracing technology.
One example he told about was how 10 years ago, society's view of cell phones was that they were devices only bought by gabbers who liked to annoy other people. People had this viceral reaction when they saw a person with a cell phone, something like, "Oh God, that person thinks they are SO important, but they just look like an idiot gabbing away." His daughter (I think) told him one day, "Why should I use a phone with a cord when I can use a phone without a cord that I can take anywhere?" When Mr. Adams had this epiphany, he immediately went out and bought a cell phone.
This was an insightful story and really hit home because I was one of those people who had a very negative view of cell phones around 10 years ago, for no real reason other than they were new. Irony of all ironies though, Mr. Adams died on a treadmill (fake walking device) soon after.
Now there was a guy who always knew where his towel was.
So long, and thanks for all the books.
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
I'm surprised they didn't have an interview with David Prowse. He was close friends w/ Douglas Adams and worked with him on the BBC HHGTG show. I met him at DragonCon several years ago, shortly after Adams' death, and he had many interesting stories to tell.
... don't forget the towel day this year guys!
http://www.towelday.kojv.net/
chris
Anyone remember when this was posted? Man, the earth stood still that day for me.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Just an FYI. And he does it very well from the examples on the international HHGTTG movie site.
Actually, that was from an HBO special, "Live from Aspen" I believe, that was hosted by Robert Klein. It's one of the available programs in the "Monty Python Live" 2 DVD set...well, here in the States anyway. I'm not sure if they're distributed any differently outside of the U.S. and Canada.
Terry Gilliam "accidentally" kicked the urn from a coffee table that was on the stage in front of him. A butler came out with a Dust Buster. Some of the other Pythons pushed some of the remaining ashes under the area rug. Definitely one of the funniest moments of the entire show.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
Douglas Adams was one of my influences in my writing, my humor, and my ability to take a look at things in life. I'm glad he's getting additional attention with the film.
Goodbye and thanks for all the books.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
You misspelled "Cancer of the Larynx which had spread to the liver and other areas."
HTH
HAND
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Two memorials by Richards Dawkins from 2001 are here ("a keening lament, written too soon to be balanced, too soon to be carefully thought through") and a eulogy here.
The latter piece includes this quote from Adams:
It's a reminder that the best way to remember Adams is to re-read what he wrote.
I'd pay real money to see that, actually.
We erected a tribute page on our website in his honor:
http://www.studentgroups.ucla.edu/abs/douglasadams /
Two years later, we finally ran our Big Event, with Bill Nye the Science Guy and Dr. Jill Tarter of SETI fame. We opened with a dedication to Adams. Here are pictures from the event:
http://homepage.mac.com/uniace/PhotoAlbum21.html
I wonder just how much the combined stress of trying to get Hollywood to make a movie, plus fighting off rabid publishers after another HHGTTG novel, contributed to his heart attack.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
He was a huge man: when he was in a house it rattled and you always knew he was there. He did the same to the Earth. It doesn't rattle anymore now that he's gone.
Amen to that.
The Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy game is one of the best and most difficult text-mode adventure game ever written. It was co-written by Douglas Adams and Steve Meretzky (author of the famous Planetfall and Sorceror, among others).
t ml
The BBC has an interview with Meretzky about how his collaboration with Adams went, a great, long and detailed text, full of information. Now, that's good reporting!
Read it here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hitchhikers/stevem.sh
Perpetual motion device: Harness the energy of DOUGLAS ADAMS SPINNING IN HIS FUCKING GRAVE. I _just_ got back from seeing the movie, and as much as i love HHGTG, it was _horrible_. In Hounor of Douglas, let's all pretend like it never happened.
I didn't know Douglas Adams, but I knew the guy who killed him.
Adams lived and worked out in Montecito, CA, right next to Santa Barbara where I live. At the time I worked out at a small gym called just "The Club" down on lower State Street. It was kind of a personal-trainer gym and most of the people who worked out there had trainers.
Three of the trainers decided to start their own private gym in Montecito, and one of them had Adams as a client. That was where he died.
Apparently the private gym didn't have defibrillator equipment, nor had these personal trainers had any classes in using that kind of equipment. Adams' unexpected heart attack didn't have to be fatal. As he lay gasping his last breaths at the foot of this trainer, a guy I had seen around The Club, the trainer just stood there staring helplessly, wondering what to do.
It's a sad story, and the lesson is, make sure your gym has defib equipment, and make sure the trainers know how to use it. It could save your life some day. Don't let yourself end up as another preventable tragedy like Douglas Adams.
He did in fact pass away in 1989.
I think it is interesting, and a little sad, that Douglas's name has been so low-key among all the publicity and hype for this movie. The trailers just said "From the celebrated best-selling novel" - but omitted to mention who wrote it. On the other hand, it may be best for Douglas Adams's reputation that he isn't linked too closely with the film. Despite what many people are saying, he didn't write it. He wrote a screenplay which Disney rejected, then he died, and then another writer came in and wrote a new screenplay incorporating material from Douglas's version. WGA rules mean that both writers are credited, though they never met. Hurrah for disney bastarding another great story.
Who cares what their motives are? After I'm gone, I expect my friends will immediately share stories of me, and take at least some joy in it. If a sleazy Hollywood producer, for whatever purely selfish reason, got some friends, a few years later, to share some stories of me with a wide public, and more people got some joy from that, it would be worth it. In fact, one of the few saving graces of such Hollywood sleazebags is that their personal benefit is sometimes tied to improving the lives of the rest of us, often long after the main players are dead. The dead, of course, do not care a jot about the entire business.
Maybe you're bitter only becuase there's zero chance of your receiving such treatment?
--
make install -not war
I dont get to name drop on this forum much, but when I was a teenager back in Wales, there was a stage production of HHGTG at the local student theatre (Sherman Theatre?). I remember them serving Pan galatic gargleblasters during the reception, and that myself and my friend James got to say Hi to him. I dont have any witty epitaphs to report, just remembering that he was very tall and sanguine. Thinking about it now, sort of a taller, thinner, less bearded Terry Pratchett.
Winton
From tomorrow's AP newswire:
Havoc brought the Internet to its knees today with the opening of the movie "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" across the United States. Millions of fans, a disproportionate number of whom work in information technology related fields, scrambled to connect to clogged servers to change their passwords. Apprarently, upon realizing the positive press the movie was receiving, and assuming that the resurfacing of certain plot elements into the public consciousness was imminent, hordes of panic stricken IT workers simultaneously tried to change all of their passwords. One anonymous senior technical staff member of a major blue-chip company was quoted as saying "We estimate that fully one third of the passwords on our corporate intranet involved the number 42. Within hours of the broadcast of the movie review on NPR's All Things Considered, our server load and request for authentications shot through the roof." John Smedly of Sony Online Entertainment reportedly said "We received a huge number of requests for lost passwords over the past 24 hours. It seems many people could not remember exactly what their saved password was, but knew that it contained the number '42'." As a consequence, Everquest and Everquest 2, popular online game titles, were inaccessible for almost an entire day. Password issues were less common on Blizzard's World Of Warcraft servers, but their incidence among high level characters was still high enough to cause several server crashes. As of this afternoon, the internet log-jam has still not resolved itself, but signs that the torrent of password changes is abating have begun to emerge. Said one security researcher, "Now lets hope they never make any movies about Babylon 5, Blake's 7, or Doctor Who."
I was reading the article with the free version of Opera. I looked up in the top-right corner and noticed that the Google text ads were suggesting two places I could buy towels.
Redundancy is good And also good.
While Douglas Adams was visiting Anchorage Alaska he gave a talk "An Evening with Douglas Adams" in 97/98.
After a rather lengthy soliloquay on his doings, mostly consisting of his in depth searches for very rare animals on the planet (dolphins in the Yangzee for example), he opened the gathering to question and answer time. Fortunately he'd apparently already alotted half the time to doing this cause lets face it.. Fans Have Questions.
A friend of mine stood up and thanked him for taking a side trip to our state (Alaska is Never on anyones route). Then she offered up her towel in the sign of the sworn follower and asked "Where is your towel?".
He kind of giggled then went on to tell the story of how the towel came about.
Before the radio show came into existance, he'd spent quite a lot of time hanging about the beach on the Mediterranean Sea. Rumor has it that he even spent some time there with Sean Connery at one point although I can't recall if he mentioned that at the time.
It seems that every day he and his chums would head out from their beach house to go for the swim. He pointed out that why on earth it was called a "beach house" was beyond him since it was over 2 miles from the beach. None the less it was all they could afford to rent for their holidays.
Nearly every day, he would find himself half way to the beach before he'd realize - in fact - he was totally and completely devoid of a towel.
After four or five days in a row of this, it became a fixture in their routine and then became a metaphor on life where in there were "the sort of people who knew where their towel was, and the sort of people that didn't"
"I of course", he lamented "was one of the latter - but its amazing that so many of you think that I'm the sort of fellow that knows where his towel is."
He was a brilliant orator, speaking much like he writes: Several paragraphs of amusing setup with one solid thrust to the funny bone at the end to make sure your no longer seated in your upright position. I will miss him always.