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Tuesday 13 January 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.
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von Däniken, Erich
(1935-2026) Swiss author of a series of purportedly nonfiction books, beginning with Erinnerungen an die Zukunft (1968; trans Michael Heron as Chariots of the Gods? 1969), which, based on a mass of often suspect and internally inconsistent data, argues that the Earth was visited by at least one Alien spacefaring race before and at the dawn of historical time; thus, for example, the Great Pyramid of ...
Wilson, Anna
(1954- ) UK-born author, now in the US. Both of her novels are sharp Feminist parables. Altogether Elsewhere (1985) depicts a Near-Future feminist vigilante backlash against male violence. Hatching Stones (1991) portrays a society in which males largely abandon females when Genetic Engineering allows them to Clone ...
Cronin, Bernard
Working name of UK-born author Charles Bernard Cronin (1884-1968), in Australia from 1890; he is better known in sf under the pseudonym Eric North, a byline he used mostly on stories for younger readers; he is also credited with other pseudonyms in other genres, normally using his own name for novels set in rural Australia. However, The Treasure of the Tropics (4 May-26 June 1926 Pals; 1928), a Lost World tale ...
Delta Space Mission
1. Romanian animated tv series (1983; original title Misiunea spatialã Delta). Created by Victor Antonescu. Directors include Victor Antonescu, Călin Cazan, Laurențiu Sîrbu and Mircea Toia. Writers include Victor Antonescu. Thirteen eight-minute episodes. Colour. / The creator, Antonescu, was involved with only four of the episodes. In that era of Romanian animation a director only had the resources to produce two ...
Fleming, Peter
(1907-1971) UK journalist, author and travel writer, brother of Ian Fleming, known mainly for such travel books as Brazilian Adventure (1933), whose gritty irreverence (both for the place visited and for the visitor) made him famous. In his spoof sf novel, The Flying Visit (1940), Adolf Hitler parachutes into the UK with amusing results (the book was published before Rudolf Hess's actual descent upon Scotland in May 1941). The tale was ...
Clute, John
(1940- ) Canadian critic, editor and author, in the UK from 1969; married to Judith Clute from 1964, partner of Elizabeth Hand since 1996. He began to publish work of genre interest with an sf-tinged poem "Carcajou Lament" in Triquarterly for Winter 1960 [ie Autumn 1959]; he began consistently publishing sf reviews in his "New Fiction" column for the Toronto Star (1966-1967), and later in ...