[reading] Знатокам Адамса

[piggymouse]

Два вопроса:

1. Имеет ли Ford Prefect какое-либо отношение к программному продукту Word Perfect?
2. Имеет ли super-fly, об изобретении которого рассказывается в самом конце "So long…", какое-либо отношение к suepahfly, обессмерченному великим Джо?

Comments

[caseq.livejournal.com]

По поводу (1) там же честно написано, что он в процессе предварительного исследования неправильно определил "dominant life form". Как я понимаю, Prefect -- это модель форда, которая какое-то время была очень популярна в Англии.

[piggymouse.livejournal.com]

А, вот, нашёл.

Ford Prefect

1. The Ford Prefect was a line of British automobiles produced by the U.K. section of the Ford Motor Company. The Ford Prefect was introduced in 1938, built by the Ford plant in Dagenham, Essex. The original Ford Prefect was a slight reworking of the previous year's Ford 7W, the first Ford car designed outside of Detroit, Michigan. It was designed specifically for the British market. The Prefect continued to be made with little change from the 1930s design until 1952. In 1953 a much redesigned Ford Prefect was introduced, which continued in production until 1959. It was similar to the Ford Anglia and the Ford Popular. In addition to the U.K., Ford Prefects were also sold in Australia.

2. The fictional character Ford Prefect in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is named after the Ford Prefect car, although author Douglas Adams later observed that the joke was lost on U.S. audiences (и не только — piggymouse) who assumed it was a joke on "perfect". The character (an alien from a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse) is pretending to be an ordinary British man, but had "skimped on his preliminary research" and assumed that the name would be "nicely inconspicuous". Adams explained in an interview that Ford "had simply mistaken the dominant life form", although some commentators believe this explanation to be apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate.

[agaspher.livejournal.com]

Смутно припоминается, что и в названии машины, и в названии редактора обыгрывается некая латинская поговорка.

[yms.livejournal.com]

По-моему, очевидно, что в названии редактора обыграли персонажа (скорее персонажа, чем машину).