- Slartibartfast: Come. Come now or you will be late.
- Arthur: Late? What for?
- Slartibartfast: What is your name, human?
- Arthur: Dent. Arthur Dent.
- Slartibartfast: Late as in the late Dentarthurdent. It's a sort of threat, you see. I've never been terribly good at them myself but I'm told they can be terribly effective.
- The Book: Many men of course became extremely rich but this was perfectly natural and nothing to be ashamed of because no one was really poor, at least no one worth speaking of.
- The Book: Men were real men. Women were real women. And small, furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small, furry creatures from Alpha Centauri.
- Slartibartfast: It is most gratifying that your enthusiasm for our planet continues unabated. And so, we would like to assure you that the guided missiles currently converging with your ship are part of a special service we extend to all of our most enthusiastic clients, and the fully-armed nuclear warheads are of course merely a courtesy detail. We look forward to your custom in future lives.
- Eddie: I'm waiting. I can wait all day if necessary.
- Zaphod Beeblebrox: Computer, if you don't open that exit hatch pretty damn pronto, I shall go straight to your major data banks with a very large axe and give you a reprogramming you will never forget. Capisco?
- [pause]
- Zaphod Beeblebrox: Okay. Get the axe.
- Zaphod Beeblebrox: Into the interior of the planet. That is where we have to go. Down into the very depths of time itself where no man has trod these five million years. We are not gonna be great. We are not gonna be amazing. We are gonna be amazingly amazing!
- Marvin: Sounds awful.
- Zaphod Beeblebrox: Can it, Marvin.
- Marvin: Life. Loathe it or ignore it. You can't like it.
- Slartibartfast: Is that your robot?
- Marvin: No. I'm mine.
- Arthur: Well, if you call it a robot. It's more like an electronic sulking machine.
- Slartibartfast: Bring it.
- Marvin: "Bring it. Bring it."
- Slartibartfast: On second thoughts, leave it here.
- Arthur Dent: The Earth!
- Slartibartfast: Well, the Earth Mark II, in fact. We're making a copy from our original blueprints.
- Arthur Dent: Are you telling me you originally made the Earth?
- Slartibartfast: Oh, yes. Did you ever go to a place - I think it was called Norway?
- Arthur Dent: No. No, I didn't.
- Slartibartfast: Pity. That was one of mine. Won an award, you know. Lovely crinkly edges.
- The Book: On the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars, and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins believed that they were more intelligent than man for precisely the same reasons.
- [as a pair of nuclear missiles close in on the Heart of Gold]
- Zaphod Beeblebrox: Hey, this is terrific, they're trying to kill us! You know what that means?
- Arthur Dent: Yes, we're going to die.
- Arthur Dent: Excuse me, what is your name by the way?
- Slartibartfast: My name?
- [pause]
- Slartibartfast: My name is Slartibartfast.
- Arthur Dent: I beg your pardon?
- Slartibartfast: Slartibartfast.
- Arthur Dent: [laughing] Slartibartfast?
- Slartibartfast: I said it wasn't important.
- Ford Prefect: Proving nothing. I wouldn't trust that computer to speak my weight.
- Eddie: I can do that for you, sure.
- Ford Prefect: No, thank you.
- Eddie: I can even work out your personality problems to ten decimal places if it'll help.
- Slartibartfast: I was most upset to hear of its destruction.
- Arthur: *You* were upset?
- Slartibartfast: Five minutes later and it wouldn't have mattered so much. Shocking cock up. The mice were furious.
- Arthur: Mice?
- Slartibartfast: You must come with me or you will be late!
- Arthur Dent: Late? What for?
- Slartibartfast: What is your name, human?
- Arthur Dent: Dent, Arthur Dent.
- Slartibartfast: Late as in the late Dent Arthur Dent. It's a sort of threat, you see.
- Eddie: [he's been switched to his Emergency Back-up Personality, which sounds like a nagging mother] Now this is going to be your first day on a strange planet, so I want you all to dress up snug and warm and no playing with any naughty bug-eyed monsters!
- [first lines]
- Narrator: Far back in the mists of ancient time, in the great and glorious days of the former Galactic Empire, life was wild, rich, and, on the whole, tax-free.
- Ford Prefect: Zaphod, I can't help what you may personally be in orbit around, but this ship...
- Zaphod Beeblebrox: Computer!
- Ford Prefect: [wincing as if in deep pain] Oh no!
- Eddie: Hi there. This is Eddie, your shipboard computer, and I'm feeling just great, guys, and I know I'm just going to get a bundle of kicks out of any program you care to run through me.