Douglas Adams - Early life

Douglas Adams was born to Janet (Donovan) Adams (now Janet Thrift) and Christopher Douglas Adams in Cambridge, England. His parents had one other child together: Susan who was born in March 1955. His parents separated and divorced in 1957, and Douglas, Susan and Janet moved in with Janet's parents, the Donovans, in Brentwood, Essex. Douglas's grandmother kept her house as an official RSPCA refuge for hurt animals, which "exacerbated young Douglas's hayfever and asthma." ^{See also:}

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Adams first attended Primrose Hill Primary School in Brentwood, Essex. He took the exams and interviewed for Brentwood School at age six, and attended from 1959 to 1970. Adams attended different divisions of the school, including the Prep School and the Middle School. While at the prep school, he had an English class, taught by Frank Halford, where Halford awarded Adams the only ten out of ten of his entire teaching career for a creative writing exercise. Adams remembered this for the rest of his life, especially when facing writer's block. ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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Adams died of a heart attack at the age of 49, while working out at a private gym in Santa Barbara, California. (He had moved to Santa Barbara in 1999.) He was survived by his wife Jane and daughter Polly. He was buried in Highgate Cemetery in north London. In May 2002, The Salmon of Doubt was published, containing many short stories, essays, and letters, and eulogies from Richard Dawkins, Stephen Fry (in the UK edition), Christopher Cerf (in the US edition), and Terry Jones (in the US paperback edition). It also includes eleve ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy on audio and video: The original 12 radio episodes (from 1978 and 1980) are available in CD sets from BBC Audio (as The Primary & Secondary Phases), as well as on a single MP3-CD. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was the first radio series released on Compact Disc and on MP3-CD, respectively, by the then BBC Radio Collection. The three additional phases adapted from the last three books in the series are available from BBC Audio. The Tertiary Phase was broadcast on BBC Radio 21 Septe ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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Douglas Adams - Religion. Adams was a self-declared "radical atheist", though he used the term for emphasis, so that he would not be asked if he in fact meant agnostic. He stated in an interview with American Atheists [16] that this was easier and conveyed the fact that he really meant it, had thought about it a great deal, and that it was an opinion he held seriously. He was convinced that there is not a god, seeing not a shred of evidence of one's existence, and devoted himsel ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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His official biography, Wish You Were Here, by Nick Webb, was published on 6 October 2003 (ISBN 0755311558). [22] Another recent biography is Hitchhiker: a Biography of Douglas Adams (2003) by M. J. Simpson, with a foreword (in the UK edition) by John Lloyd (ISBN 0340824883). The American edition contains a foreword by Neil Gaiman (ISBN 1932112170). Upon the mutual discovery that Webb and Simpson were both working on new posthumous biographies, the two authors agreed that the former would focus on Adams's life ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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Douglas Adams created an interactive fiction version of HHGG together with Steve Meretzky from Infocom in 1984. In 1986 he participated in a weeklong brainstorming session with the Lucasfilm Games team for the game, Labyrinth. Later he was also involved in creating Bureaucracy (also by Infocom, but not based on any book). Adams was also responsible for the computer game Starship Titanic, which was published in 1999 by Simon and Schuster. Terry Jones wrote the accompanying book, entitled Douglas Adams’s Starsh ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was a concept for a science-fiction comedy radio series pitched by Adams and radio producer Simon Brett to BBC Radio 4 in 1977. Adams came up with an outline for a pilot episode, as well as a few other stories (reprinted in Neil Gaiman's book Don't Panic: The Official Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Companion) that could potentially be used in the series. According to Adams, the idea for the title The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy occurred to him while he lay drunk in a fiel ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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Adams sent the script for the HHGG pilot radio programme to the Doctor Who production office in 1978, and was commissioned to write The Pirate Planet (see below). He had also previously attempted to submit a potential movie script, called "Doctor Who and the Krikkitmen," which later became his novel Life, the Universe, and Everything (which in turn became the third Hitchhiker's Guide radio series). Adams then went on to serve as script editor on the show for its seventeenth season in 1979. Altogether, he wrote thr ...

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Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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Adams played guitar, left-handed, and had a collection of twenty-four of these instruments when he died in 2001 (having received his first left-hand guitar in 1964). He also took piano lessons in the 1960s from the same teacher who taught Paul Wickens, who later played keyboards in Paul McCartney's band (and composed the music for the 2004-2005 editions of The Hitchhiker's Guide radio series). [12] Music, and in particular The Beatles, Pink Floyd and Procol Harum had great influences on Adams's professional life. See also:

Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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In between Adams's first trip to Madagascar with Mark Carwardine in 1985, and their series of travels that formed the basis for the radio series and non-fiction book Last Chance to See, Adams wrote two other novels with a new cast of characters. Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency was first published in 1987, and was described by its author as "a kind of ghost-horror-detective-time-travel-romantic-comedy-epic, mainly concerned with mud, music and quantum mechanics." ^{See also:}

Douglas Adams, Douglas Adams - Early life, Douglas Adams - Education and early works, Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams - Doctor Who, Douglas Adams - Music, Douglas Adams - Pink Floyd, Douglas Adams - Procol Harum, Douglas Adams - Other musical links, Douglas Adams - Computer games and projects, Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently, Douglas Adams - Personal beliefs, Douglas Adams - Religion, Douglas Adams - Environmentalism, Douglas Adams - Technology, Douglas Adams - Personal life, Douglas Adams - Adams's death, Douglas Adams - Biographies, Douglas Adams - Douglas Adams's works, Douglas Adams - Novels in the HHGG series, Douglas Adams - The Dirk Gently series, Douglas Adams - Other works, Douglas Adams - Tributes and honorifics, Douglas Adams - Notes

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