English Internal 1.10:
Response 1 – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
“The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” written by Douglas Adams explores the idea that the quest for knowledge can consume us.
The idea that the quest for knowledge can consume us, is shown through the mice. The mice had spent seventeen and a half million years, attempting to solve the answer to “Life, the Universe, and everything.” By specifically choosing seventeen and a half million years, it emphasises just how long the mice had spent on their research. However, just five minutes before they were supposed to get their answer, the Earth was destroyed. Despite this, immediately afterward, the surviving mice from Earth ask Slartibartfast (a planet builder) to recreate the Earth, so that they can recreate their research and experiment. This is because they have been consumed by their search for knowledge and refuse to accept that the last few million years of work have been for nothing. This idea is highlighted, when Arthur (the protagonist) questions the mice as to why they decided to continue on their highly unusual, fruitless, time-consuming, pursuit for answers, their response shows that they are not motivated out of enjoyment or fulfilment, rather they are consumed by this pursuit, saying that they do it “out of habit really.” Once the mice realised that they would be unable to recreate their experiment, consumed by their quest for the answer to the ‘ultimate question’, they immediately started scrambling to find a question that suited the answer of forty-two, while also appearing to solve the answer to life the universe and everything, so that they had something to impress the public. “Sounds very significant without actually tying you down to meaning at all. How many roads must a man walk down? Forty-two. Excellent, excellent, that’ll fox ‘em. Frankie baby, we are made!” The quote shows how the mice had refused to accept that the exorbitant amount...
