Mr. Adams later recalled how he first thought of the book during a trip around Europe as a teen. At one point I found myself lying in the middle of a field, a little bit drunk, when it occurred to me that somebody should write a hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy. It didn't occur to me that it might actually be me years later. In August 1996, he told a technology conference in New Orleans that the main problem in adapting the series for film was not special effects. It's the nature of the story, which is picaresque, which translates to one damn thing after another, and another, and another.
Every script has a beginning and a middle and an end.
Mr. Adams married Jane Belson, a lawyer, in 1991. Mr. Adams also is survived by his mother, Jan Thrift of England.