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Saturday 7 February 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 6 February 2026
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Sallis, James
(1944-2026) US musician, poet and author, briefly active in New Worlds during its Michael Moorcock-directed New-Wave phase; he began to publish work of genre interest in this context with "Kazoo" (August 1967 New Worlds) and co-edited the magazine 1968-1969. His clearly acknowledged models in the French avant garde and the gnomic brevity of much of his work ...
Francis, Marianne
(? - ) UK author of Egyptian Light (1950), a dynastic-fantasy-like tale set in Atlantis, featuring a princess in flight and her espousal to the Egyptian pharaoh (see Ancient Egypt in SF) who rescues her after shipwreck. Atlantis sinks. [JC]
Allais, Alphonse
(1854-1905) French journalist and author, mostly of humorous pieces; his newspaper column, La Vie Drôle ["The Funny Life"] contained many skits and spoofs and other pieces, often fantastical. The various tales about Captain Cap appeared in this column and in other similar venues. Cap is based on a real person – Albert Caperon (1864-1898), a much-travelled adventurer and man about town – and Allais retired Captain Cap tales after Caperon's death, though he ...
Van Beverhoudt, O
(1871-? ) US author in whose Melzar: A Tale of the Jericho Road (1913) a Lost Race is discovered in the deserts of northern Africa. [JC]
Night on the Galactic Railroad
Japanese animated film (1985). Original title Ginga Tetsudō no Yoru. Group TAC, Nippon Herald, TV Asahi. Based on the novella by Kenji Miyazawa. Directed by Gisaburo Sugii. Written by Minoru Betsuyaku. Voice cast includes Hidehiro Kikuchi, Kaori Nakahara, Chika Sakamoto and Mayumi Tanaka. 110 minutes. Colour. / A young anthropomorphized cat, Giovanni (Tanaka), is late joining his classmates by the river to ...
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 ...