The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Summary | Chapter 1 Summary

Arthur Dent is a thirty-year-old Englishman who is tall, with dark hair and "never quite at ease with himself." One Thursday morning he wakes up with a hangover and vaguely remembers he had learned something unpleasant the previous afternoon, but can't remember what it was. As he stumbles hazily through his morning routine, he is dimly aware of the presence of a big, yellow bulldozer as he periodically glances out through his window - but at first fails to understand the significance. Suddenly, he remembers why he went to the pub the night before to drown his sorrows, and the memory prompts him to sudden action.

Well, perhaps "inaction" is a better word, because "fifteen seconds later" we find Arthur Dent lying in the mud in front of his house, determined to prevent the bulldozer's razing it to the ground to make way for a new bypass. Mr. Prosser, the project foreman, tries to convince Arthur to give up, reminding him that the plans for the bypass have been available in the local planning office for the past nine months. Arthur agrees that as soon as he'd found out about the plans (the previous afternoon) he had gone straight to the planning office, and sure enough, found the plans on "display" in the "bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard." Additionally, this lavatory is in a dark basement that happens not to be equipped with stairs.

As his discussion with the foreman continues, one of Arthur's closest friends turns up. Arthur thinks his friend is an out-of-work actor, but he is really a stranded space traveler from "somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse," who has been trying to blend inconspicuously into earth society. Choosing what he believed was a common earth name, "Ford Prefect" spends his time watching for any flying saucer that might be able to take him back home, while at the same time collecting research for a book called, "The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy."

Ford Prefect wants Arthur to go to the pub with him to discuss something very important. Naturally, Arthur is reluctant to do this, considering the bulldozer might tear down his house while he's gone, but fortunately Ford Prefect is able to convince the foreman to lie down in Arthur's place, promising that when they come back they'll stand in for Mr. Prosser, so he can have a turn at the pub. This all seems vaguely logical to Mr. Prosser, and even to Arthur - who consents to accompany his friend to the pub. Nevertheless, he's compelled to ask Ford whether he really thinks they can trust Mr. Prosser to keep his word. When Ford assures him that he'd trust him to the end of the Earth, Arthur digests this, but asks his friend, "and how far's that?"

"About twelve minutes away," Ford answers. At this point, the reader is pretty sure that Ford Prefect is being quite literal.