Life, the Universe, and Everything is an extremely moving book. While the main character, Arthur Dent, is traveling through space and time, he ends up in a mysterious cave with a character who we come to know as Agrajag. Agrajag has vowed to kill Arthur Dent to take his revenge. As it turns out, Agrajag has been reincarnated over the years, thousands of years, and each life has ended with him being killed by Arthur Dent. He has been killed as a rabbit, fly, human, flea, an ant numerous times, and, as it turns out, a bowl of petunias. To understand why this last one moved me, we must first journey back to the first Hitchhiker's book, where as 2 missiles are headed for their space craft, Arthur Dent hits an improbability button where the least probable thing often occurs; this turned the missiles into a bowl of petunias and a sperm whale. These two things fell to the ground below and promptly died. With this knowledge, I was moved to laughter immediately and for a long time ensuing. To think that an author would reference something like two books back was unexpected, and in my opinion, brilliant. I know that the term "moving" often applies to touching situations, but in this book, one that is meant to be funny, I felt that something that moved to me to literally laugh out loud, not something books can often make people do, would correctly describe a moving situation.
This book often moves me to laughter and I find myself struggling to keep quiet while reading it in study hall. Douglas Adams' brilliant story takes very many unexpected twists and turns and is constantly referencing things that happened in the previous books and that makes it an extremely moving and memorable experience, and one which has affected the way I look at everyday things, like a bowl of petunias.
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