Daniel replies:

Who chose him, and why? I read that book. It was good. I'm a better writer because I have no need to tell people that I'm cute, it being so conclusively obvious. Smart too. And my readers are smarter than Adams's readers because nobody ever heard of me and there isn't a big body of opinion telling them it's cool to read my stuff. One guy wrote to me that he schlepped some book of mine way up in the Himalayas to some obscure monastery where there was a living bodhisattva, and he got him to read the book. The lama's comment was, ""Yeah? So what?"" I have never been more proud even when the mongoose peed on my shoes or when the wolf let me know it was inclined to bite me, but wasn't going to.