cjh (03/14/83)
Douglas Adams has been quoted as saying that he picked 42 because it seemed like a relatively ordinary number which wouldn't be a joke in and of itself. It seems that his memory or subconscious may have tricked him; I was told yesterday of an English fanzine editor who has published a zine called "42" for several years and has recently (to his distress) been inundated with "Hitchies" (well, that's what \he/ calls them). He named his zine after mentions in the works of Lewis Carroll (among other things, 42 comes up in "The Hunting of the Snark").
jhc (04/07/83)
There is at least one other occurence of 42 in Carroll: in The Hunting of the Snark, Fit the (aaaah - I forgot). The stanza is (from memory) He had forty-two boxes all carefully packed With his name clearly painted on each But since he neglected to mention the fact They were all left behind on the beach. As I recall, 'he' is the Banker, and that is the reason that nobody knew his name (it was on the boxes, which were...) throughout the agony. Anyone got copies of each handy for the publication dates ? I suspect that 'Wonderland' predates 'Snark', but without my copies of the Annotated Alice/Snark I am lost. Jonathan Clark ABI Holmdel [houx*|ariel]!hou5a!jhc
bhayes (04/20/83)
#R:hou5a:-32000:sri-unix:13200019:000:117 sri-unix!bhayes Apr 16 16:52:00 1983 Fit the First, Baker, A's A in W'l in 1865, T the L G, a W A F T in 1871, and T H of the S, an A in E F in 1876. -b