h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This is the part of the film where I usually go to make a cup of tea and rummage in the kitchen for a toothpick to put a mini sausage and piece of cheese on. On the first viewing I didn't like it and never seem to have given it another chance.

I read your entry to see if it would change my mind. Next Christmas I'll suppress the urge to get a cuppa and pork pie and watch the whole song instead.

Nice entry.

I hope you see it! Thanks for posting!

Recently hearing this song again, after 50 years, it gave me what is called a “peak experience”, and I burst into tears from joy and sadness.

The street-hawkers all chiming in, canonically and in beautiful harmony. That is what we all do in coming to earth, we offer something to others. It is sad if what we offer is rejected, but not too sad, so long as we realize that we are more than what we offer.

Then, there is Oliver, singing about the awesome morning. We have all had that strange and sudden moment, when all the pain and depression lift, and there is a burst of joy, from inside. It can almost seem as if the top of your head comes off. This is what Colin Wilson talks about, in book after book, referring to Chesterton’s phrase: “sudden good news”.

The difficulty, here on earth, is preserving that joy. It never lasts. I felt that Lionel Bart was inspired in writing this song. The lyric even talks, ironically, about boxing up the morning, with a ribbon and bow – and rhetorically asks: “So what am I to do, to keep the sky so blue?”

So strange to be here on earth. Stuck in the mud, knowing deep down that there is much better, unable to reach or preserve it very long. Ah, well, back to work…