Sadly this class is coming to a close, but I'd like to think it goes out like a bang. Just like Earth in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. For the final week, the assignment was the listen to the radio version of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. At first I was really skeptical. I am a very visual person, so radio plays seem to really freak me out. It's really sad because it's almost impossible for me to focus on just talking. When I am listening to something my mind will wander and I'll lose my focus and then I'll hone back into the radio cast after a while, but I'll have lost my place and will have ended up very confused because of it. It takes me forever to get through something because I'll have to rewind and replay a certain section a thousand times to understand it. When I am watching television, if I don't catch something I at least have visual clues to fall back on to understand what was said. And even then I don't trust myself, and when available I always have subtitles on so I can listen, read, and view what is happening. I like reading or at least reading along better because I can "pause" it and come back to it. And I was excited to see a radio script listened under the resource page, but it seemed to just lead to a version of the book, which was nice in it's own right, but it didn't match up with the radio cast so it was useless in this case.
After about forty minutes I was able to get the hang of it and listen into it just a little bit better. I really liked the intro and outro to the different sections of the show. I can imagine that this radio cast was played episodically on different radio stations across the country. I was somehow surprised that it played for 20 to 25 minute intervals. I guess I forget that a normal consumer wouldn't sit in front of their radio for three plus hours to listen to a radio version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The only thing that I could never seem to grasp was when the different voice actors were talking. Arthur and Ford's voices were too similar that I would lose track of which one was speaking and then end up confused after the end of a piece of dialogue.
It was also really nice to see this work in another light. I have read most of this book and seen the movie many times. They all tell the story a bit different by they weave themselves together really nicely to create this small universe that just revolves around Adams' writings. There were things that enriched both the viewing and reading of the novel. It's like the trifecta of senses that when appreciated together just heighten the consumer's love for the work. When you read, everything is stuck up in your mind. You are able to imagine things very well, but you can only read in your voice. Everything starts to take on bits of your character and you imagine things only within the breadth of your normal aesthetic. When you watch a movie, everything is done for you. There is not a lot for you to imagine up on your own. But, a radio play allows you to imagine everything with the help on an audio track. Everything is supplied for you, you just have to lay back and imagine the gross Vogons.
All in all, it was very pleasant. I enjoyed the voice and the folly acting was very good. It was nice to experience a novel in a not so typical way.
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