The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

First edition cover
Author	Douglas Adams
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Series	Hitchhiker's Guide
Genre	Science fiction novel
Publisher	Pan Macmillan
Publication date	1 January 1980
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages	208 (paperback edition)
ISBN	0-345-39181-0
OCLC	33352356
Preceded by	The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Followed by	Life, the Universe and Everything

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1980, ISBN 0-345-39181-0) is the second book in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction trilogy of five by Douglas Adams. It was originally published by Pan Books as a paperback. The book was inspired by the song "Grand Hotel" by British rock band Procol Harum. It takes its name from Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, one of the settings of the book.

Plot summary

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe begins just as The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy ended. Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Trillian, and Zaphod Beeblebrox have just left the planet Magrathea when they are attacked by a Vogon ship. They find they are unable to use the Improbability Drive to escape, as Arthur has accidentally jammed the computer with a simple request for a cup of tea which proved a rather difficult problem. Luckily, an ancestor of Zaphod's, Zaphod Beeblebrox the Fourth saves them.

Zaphod and Marvin vanish, and reappear at the offices of the Guide on Ursa Minor Beta. They are looking for Zarniwoop, who has gone on an intergalactic cruise in his office via his virtual universe. Arthur, Trillian and Ford are unaware of any of this, knowing only that the computer has been shut down, and only having received a message from a stalling Nutrimatic that says "Wait."

When Zaphod and Marvin reach the fifteenth floor of the Guide's office, half of the building is lifted off the ground by Frogstar Fighters. A mysterious man named Roosta brings Zaphod to Zarniwoop's office, where they wait until the building lands on Frogstar World B. Roosta gives Zaphod final instructions before he leaves: Go through the window on his way out, not the door. Zaphod then meets Gargravarr who informs Zaphod that he is to be sent through the Total Perspective Vortex, a torture device which annihilates you by showing you just how infinitesimally small you are compared to the Universe. However when Zaphod enters it, the Vortex shows him that he is the most important thing in the Universe. Zaphod escapes, and finds Zarniwoop in the first class cabin of a spaceliner in an abandoned spaceport.

Zarniwoop explains that the Total Perspective Vortex has not malfunctioned — this is a virtual universe created by Zarniwoop for the sole benefit of Zaphod, who is the most important creature in this universe. It turns out that Zaphod had the shrunk Heart of Gold in his jacket pocket the whole time. It is reconstituted, and Zaphod is reunited with Trillian, Arthur and Ford. They escape from Zarniwoop by asking to be transported to the nearest restaurant. Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, is the nearest restaurant in space but not time. They are transported there "five hundred and seventy-six thousand million years" into the future. Marvin is left stranded here for this incredibly vast amount of time parking diners' spaceships while waiting for the humans to return. After the meal, Zaphod and Ford steal a spaceship, which turns out to be a stuntship belonging to the rock band Disaster Area, programmed to dive into a star to provide backing effects for a rock concert. There is a teleporter on the ship for which the guidance system was never built, as it was never intended to be used, and it also requires somebody to stay on the ship in order to operate it. Marvin is chosen to stay behind and teleport the others, who have no choice but to go wherever it takes them.

Zaphod and Trillian are returned to the Heart of Gold, which is commandeered by Zarniwoop to complete his mission, to discover who really rules the Universe. As it turns out, the Ruler of the Universe is entirely skeptical that he holds this position, as he is entirely skeptical of everything, including whether his cat, The Lord, really exists, or whether there is even a universe at all outside of his small isolated home. While Zarniwoop attempts to impress upon the Ruler of the Universe the reality and the weight of his position, Trillian and Zaphod sneak out and fly the Heart of Gold away.

The teleporter has meanwhile sent Arthur and Ford to the Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B, a ship of fools which crash-lands on prehistoric Earth. They realize that the bumbling travelers are the real ancestors of modern humans, not the Neanderthals originally inhabiting the planet. Arthur attempts to determine the Question to the Ultimate Answer of Life, the Universe and Everything by reaching into a Scrabble bag made from Ford's towel and pulling out letters randomly, hoping Deep Thought's computational matrix in Earth would have rubbed off on his subconscious. The letters spell "What do you get when you multiply six by seven" before running out, although the Neanderthals manage to spell "forty-two" with the tiles, implying that it is they, rather than the Golgafrinchans, who were intended to be part of Earth's computer matrix. After some brief contemplation, Ford and Arthur realize that this is, in fact, a detrimental "cock-up," and that the Earth will never produce the proper Question, thus destroying all hope of ever finding out what it is.

As Ford convinces Arthur that there is nothing that can be done to improve the inevitable history of the Earth, Arthur decides that he should make the best of his situation and settles for a life on prehistoric Earth.

Radio series

The plot is based on the last eight Fits of the original radio series (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was based on the first four). The fragments of the plot are rearranged, and some do not appear at all. For example, Arthur and Ford were stranded on prehistoric Earth at the end of Fit the Sixth and later rescued; they are now stranded at the end of the book, and the episode of their rescue is deleted. The episodes taking place on the planet Brontitall are transferred to the Frogstar and hugely compressed, omitting several characters that do not appear elsewhere.

Most significantly, in the radio series the ship stolen from the Restaurant at the End of the Universe belonged not to Disaster Area, but to the admiral of the fleet of a Haggunenons (a warlike "hyper-evolutionary" race), who would evolve into any random shape in a matter of seconds. This evolutionary instability made them very jealous of stable life forms or as they called them "filthy rotten stinking same-lings". If for example one was drinking coffee and could not reach the sugar it would, without a second thought evolve into something with much longer arms, but which was quite incapable of drinking the coffee.

In the original two radio series, Zaphod, Trillian and Marvin were all said to have escaped when the Hagunnenon Admiral "re-evolved" into an escape capsule. Zaphod wound up at the Hitchhiker's Guide offices, Trillian was married off and disappeared from the series, and Marvin wound up, through "a string of adventures," also arriving at the Hitchhiker's Guide offices. This was changed slightly in the 2004-05 radio series adaptations of the final three books: Zaphod is told that he and Trillian escaped back to the Heart of Gold together, and Marvin was left behind on the stolen Haggunenon Admiral's flagship, before being rescued. However, the original storyline is not completely ignored, though Trillian initially dismisses it (in Fit the Thirteenth) as a "psychotic episode" suffered by Zaphod: instead it was a byproduct timeline caused by the Vogons interfering with the probability axis, combined with the effects of the Total Perspective Vortex.

Audiobook adaptations

There have been three audiobook recordings of the novel. The first was an abridged edition, recorded in 1981 by Stephen Moore, best known for playing the voice of Marvin the Paranoid Android in the radio series, LP adaptations and in the TV series. In 1990, Adams himself recorded an unabridged edition, later re-released by New Millennium Audio in the United States and available from BBC Audiobooks in the United Kingdom. In 2006, actor Martin Freeman, who had played Arthur Dent in the 2005 movie, recorded a new unabridged edition of the audiobook

References in culture

The Café at the End of the Universe located at the Griffith Observatory is an homage to Adams' work.

In the online game "Dolphin Olympics 2" there is a Diner at the end of the universe.

In Stargate SG-1, when Daniel Jackson dies and begins his path of ascension to a higher being with all the power and knowledge of the universe, it is in a '50s style diner.

In Google's Guide to the App Galaxy site, there is a image of a diner at the top of the screen before the site's javascript wraps the screen around.