Adam's 'The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy' and Fata Morgana.

The supra-space ship, The Heart of Gold, captained by the Ettin-like Zaphod Beeblebrox, is a fata morgana. Powered by the Infinite Improbability Drive, she can appear at all points in the universe at once, an infinite improbability. Like a hooker with a heart of gold, The Heart of Gold ship is a fata morgana - la puta - the whore. This is first described as a floating city of adamantine that is powered by magnetic force that is found in Jonathan Swift's 1700s 'Gulliver's Travels'.