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Friday 14 August 2026
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for what we mean by Science Fiction; here for the masthead; here for some Statistics; here for the Acknowledgments; here for the FAQ; here for advice on citations. Find entries via the search box above (more details here) or browse the menu categories in the grey bar at the top of this page.
Site updated on 10 August 2026
Sponsor of the day: David Cowhig
Crowley, John
(1942-2026) US teacher and author who also worked in documentary films and television for some time beginning in 1966. His sf novels have had a considerable impact on the field, and his fantasies established him as a figure whose work courteously but deeply stretched the boundaries of genre literature. / His first novel, The Deep (1975), is set on a flat discworld resting on a pillar that extends beyond measurement into the circumambient galactic Deep, in which very few stars ...
Prus, Bolesław
Pseudonym of Polish journalist and author Aleksander Głowacki (1847-1912), who from the 1870s became one of Poland's most prominent journalists and exponents of Positivism, a movement which, in the aftermath of the failed January Uprising of 1863, emphasized education, economic and scientific development, and the gradual modernization of society rather than Romantic insurrection. He wrote extensively on Technology, science and ...
Soukup, Martha
(1959- ) US author whose work, beginning with "Dress Rehearsal" for Universe 16 (anth 1986) edited by Terry Carr, has been restricted to short stories, and who has published several stories whose surface clarity conceals taxingly insistent examinations of readerly assumptions. Soukup won a Nebula Award for Best Story for "A Defense of the Social Contracts" (September 1993 ...
Xu Zhuodai
Pen-name of Xu Fulin (1880-circa 1958), who flourished as a humorist during the 1920s in the cosmopolitan Chinese city of Shanghai, gaining the sobriquet Huaji Dafu ["The Master of Laughter"]. Among his other professions, he ran a school for acrobats, was a sometime playwright and translator, dabbled in the nascent film business, and even set up a soy sauce factory. / Among his many works of film reviews, essays and short stories, Yingxixue ...
Courage the Cowardly Dog
US animated tv series (1999-2002). Stretch Films. Created and directed by John R Dilworth. Written by Irv Bauer, David Steven Cohen, John R Dilworth and William Hohauser. Voice cast includes Arthur Anderson, Marty Grabstein, Thea White and Lionel G Wilson. 52 23-minute episodes (each usually comprising two stories), plus the pilot and a special. Colour. / Courage (Grabstein) is an abandoned Dog rescued by an old farming couple, the kindly Muriel Bagge ...
Robinson, Roger
(1943- ) UK computer programmer, bibliographer and publisher, active in UK Fandom for many years. The Writings of Henry Kenneth Bulmer (1983 chap; rev 1984 chap) is an exhaustive Bibliography of one of the most prolific sf writers, Kenneth Bulmer, and Who's Hugh?: An SF Reader's Guide to Pseudonyms (1987) is similarly exhaustive in its ...