Doubting the salmon
Jul. 24th, 2003 12:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alfvaenI just finished reading The Salmon of Doubt, the posthumous collection of Douglas Adams' writings, including the first 11 chapters(assembled from various drafts)of a new Dirk Gently novel. Dammit.
When I listened to Kirsty MacColl's "Tropical Brainstorm" album, I felt a more profound sense of loss than I did when I actually found out about her death. And now the same thing has happened with Douglas Adams. I vaguely knew he was probably an interesting person, and I had no high expectations that he would come with new books all that often. But now, having found out more about him, I feel the profound loss.
Not to mention how frustrating it is to read an unfinished book, knowing that it will never be finished--or if it is, it might be nothing like what the author had in mind. Who was paying Dirk Gently US$5000 a week, and why? What was up with Desmond the Rhinoceros? The carjacking in L.A.? "DaveLand", from the first chapter? That part was almost reminiscent of Vernor Vinge's Marooned In Realtime, but no explanation was offered...and was probably just as crucial to the plot as the Electric Monk was in the first book.
There are times when I do wish that, like in Spider Robinson's "Deathkiller" series, people from the future have come back to record the traces of dying minds, to recreate them in perfect bodies. The technological afterlife. But I can't bring myself to believe in that any more than I can the religious one. Douglas Adams would have been just as chagrined as Isaac Asimov to wake in one of those, anyway.
When I listened to Kirsty MacColl's "Tropical Brainstorm" album, I felt a more profound sense of loss than I did when I actually found out about her death. And now the same thing has happened with Douglas Adams. I vaguely knew he was probably an interesting person, and I had no high expectations that he would come with new books all that often. But now, having found out more about him, I feel the profound loss.
Not to mention how frustrating it is to read an unfinished book, knowing that it will never be finished--or if it is, it might be nothing like what the author had in mind. Who was paying Dirk Gently US$5000 a week, and why? What was up with Desmond the Rhinoceros? The carjacking in L.A.? "DaveLand", from the first chapter? That part was almost reminiscent of Vernor Vinge's Marooned In Realtime, but no explanation was offered...and was probably just as crucial to the plot as the Electric Monk was in the first book.
There are times when I do wish that, like in Spider Robinson's "Deathkiller" series, people from the future have come back to record the traces of dying minds, to recreate them in perfect bodies. The technological afterlife. But I can't bring myself to believe in that any more than I can the religious one. Douglas Adams would have been just as chagrined as Isaac Asimov to wake in one of those, anyway.
