You may, of course, believe that The Princess Bride is a reasonably quotable piece of culture, but it has nothing on Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (aside: I've not read the books for nigh on 20 years now, so my quotage may be a little imprecise).
Now, I feel I must declare my hand here, and state for the record that I consider the trilogy to comprise just the first three books - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Restaurant at the end of the Universe and Life, the Universe and Everything.
Arthur Dent is awoken in the morning on the day the book starts, to be informed that his house has been scheduled for demolition to make way for a new bypass. The book then segues into a helpful explanation of what a bypass might be, and how this may or may not be beneficial to those impacted thereby. Arthur's mate, Ford Prefect then turns up to cajole him into complying with the site foreman's wishes, since he knows that in a somewhat ironic turn of Fate, Earth itself is about to be demolished to make way for a hyperspatial bypass.
The pair escape Earth by hitching a lift, courtesy of the Dentrassi, on one of the Vogons' ships (which hang in the air in much the same way that bricks don't). Unfortunately, they're detected, and subjected to Vogon poetry as punishment. Despite the pair's best efforts to convince their host that they liked his oration (counterpoint to the surrealism of the underlying metaphor), they get thrown out of the airlock, to be picked up by Zaphod Beeblebrox (don't try to outweird me, kiddo, I get stranger things than you free with my breakfast cereal), President of the Galaxy, in a hot spaceship. 'Hot' as in stolen.
Adams' originally wrote Hitchhikers as a radio show (I used to have the radio scripts, too, complete with margin notes such as 'To the shrubbery!'), but the use of language in the prose is absolutely spectacular, and part of what makes the books so special.
Life the Universe and Everything actually contained a chapter - Agrajag's Cathedral of Hate - which I nearly couldn't finish because my eyes were literally streaming with tears, I was laughing so hard (I think it was the protestation that one of the many arms on Agrajag's statue of Arthur depicting our Hero wantonly summoning a bowl of petunias into existence {over Magrathea} wasn't a concept that sprang readily to the eye... it was sort of the straw of mirth that broke this reader's back Back In The Day).
I have read So Long and Thanks for All the Fish, and whilst it had its moments, it didn't deliver the sustained punch of earlier tomes. I haven't read Mostly Harmless - frequently meant to, but never got around to it. Writing this post has made me think that perhaps I ought to.
Now, I feel I must declare my hand here, and state for the record that I consider the trilogy to comprise just the first three books - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Restaurant at the end of the Universe and Life, the Universe and Everything.
Arthur Dent is awoken in the morning on the day the book starts, to be informed that his house has been scheduled for demolition to make way for a new bypass. The book then segues into a helpful explanation of what a bypass might be, and how this may or may not be beneficial to those impacted thereby. Arthur's mate, Ford Prefect then turns up to cajole him into complying with the site foreman's wishes, since he knows that in a somewhat ironic turn of Fate, Earth itself is about to be demolished to make way for a hyperspatial bypass.
The pair escape Earth by hitching a lift, courtesy of the Dentrassi, on one of the Vogons' ships (which hang in the air in much the same way that bricks don't). Unfortunately, they're detected, and subjected to Vogon poetry as punishment. Despite the pair's best efforts to convince their host that they liked his oration (counterpoint to the surrealism of the underlying metaphor), they get thrown out of the airlock, to be picked up by Zaphod Beeblebrox (don't try to outweird me, kiddo, I get stranger things than you free with my breakfast cereal), President of the Galaxy, in a hot spaceship. 'Hot' as in stolen.
Adams' originally wrote Hitchhikers as a radio show (I used to have the radio scripts, too, complete with margin notes such as 'To the shrubbery!'), but the use of language in the prose is absolutely spectacular, and part of what makes the books so special.
Life the Universe and Everything actually contained a chapter - Agrajag's Cathedral of Hate - which I nearly couldn't finish because my eyes were literally streaming with tears, I was laughing so hard (I think it was the protestation that one of the many arms on Agrajag's statue of Arthur depicting our Hero wantonly summoning a bowl of petunias into existence {over Magrathea} wasn't a concept that sprang readily to the eye... it was sort of the straw of mirth that broke this reader's back Back In The Day).
I have read So Long and Thanks for All the Fish, and whilst it had its moments, it didn't deliver the sustained punch of earlier tomes. I haven't read Mostly Harmless - frequently meant to, but never got around to it. Writing this post has made me think that perhaps I ought to.
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