Douglas Adams

Douglas Adams was born in Cambridge in March 1952, educated at Brentwood School, Essex and St John's College, Cambridge where, in 1974 he gained a BA (and later an MA) in English literature.

He was the creator of all the various manifestations of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which started life as a BBC Radio 4 series in March 1978. Since then it has been transformed into a series of best-selling novels, a TV series, a record album, a computer game and several stage adaptations. It is currently under development as a major motion picture with Disney.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy's phenomenal success sent the book straight to Number One in the UK Bestseller List and in 1984 Douglas Adams became the youngest author to be awarded a Golden Pan. He won a further two (a rare feat), and was nominated - though not selected - for the first Best of Young British Novelists awards.

He followed this success with The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1980); Life, The Universe and Everything (1982); So Long and Thanks for all the Fish (1984); and Mostly Harmless (1992). The first two books in the Hitchhiker series were adapted into a 6 part television series, which was an immediate success when first aired in 1982. Other publications include Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (1987) and Long Dark Tea-time of the Soul (1988). In 1984 Douglas teamed up with John Lloyd and wrote The Meaning of Liff and after a huge success The Deeper Meaning of Liff followed this in 1990). One of Douglas’s personal favourites was written in 1990 when he teamed up with zoologist Mark Carwardine and wrote Last Chance to See an account of a world-wide search for rare and endangered species of animals.

Douglas sold over 15 million books in the UK, the US and Australia. He was also a best seller in German, Swedish and many other languages

Douglas was a founder-director Chief Fantasist of The Digital Village, a digital media and Internet company with which he created the 1998 CD-ROM Starship Titanic, a Codie Award-winning (1999 ) and BAFTA-nominated (1998) adventure game.

Douglas Adams died at age 49 on Friday, May 11, 2001, in Santa Barbara, CA. He will be greatly missed by fans worldwide.