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Tuesday 14 April 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 14 April 2026
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Watson, Ian
(1943-2026) UK teacher and author who lectured in English in Tanzania (1965-1967) and Tokyo (1967-1970) before beginning to publish sf with "Roof Garden Under Saturn" for New Worlds in 1969; he then taught Future Studies for six years at Birmingham Polytechnic, taking there one of the first academic courses in sf in the UK; he became a full-time writer in 1976, publishing around 200 short stories since 1969 at a gradually increasing tempo and with visibly ...
Transcendence [film]
American film (2014). Alcon Entertainment/DMG Entertainment/Straight Up Films. Directed by Wally Pfister. Written by Jack Paglen. Cast includes Paul Bethany, Clifton Collins Jr, Johnny Depp, Morgan Freeman, Rebecca Hall, Cory Hardrict, Cole Hauser, Falk Hentschel, Kate Mara and Cillian Murphy. 119 minutes. Colour. / Brilliant Computer Scientist Will Caster (Depp), one of several researchers intent upon developing an ...
Worlds of Fantasy
1. UK pocketbook-size magazine, published by John Spencer, London; edited anonymously by Samuel Assael and Maurice Nahum. Fourteen numbered, undated issues 1950-1954. / Worlds of Fantasy is almost identical to the other three Spencer juvenile-sf magazines of the 1950s, Futuristic Science Stories, Tales of Tomorrow and ...
Village of the Damned
1. Film (1960). MGM. Directed by Wolf Rilla. Written by Sterling Silliphant, Rilla, George Barclay (Ronald Kinnoch, the producer), based on The Midwich Cuckoos (1957; rev 1958; vt Village of the Damned 1960) by John Wyndham. Cast includes George Sanders, Barbara Shelley and Martin Stephens. 77 minutes. Black and white. / In this faithful but pedestrian adaptation of Wyndham's novel, everyone in a UK village ...
Mama Wa Shōgaku Yon-Nensei
["Mama Is a 4th Grader"] Japanese animated tv series (1992). Sunrise, NTV, AsatsuDK, Vap. Directed by Shūji Iuchi. Written by Osamu Nakamura, Tetsuko Watanabe, Yumi Kageyama et al. Cast includes Kazue Ikura, Satomi Kōrogi and Riyoko Yoshida. 51 episodes of 25 minutes. Colour. / An accident in the year 2007 sends the infant Mirai ["Future"] through a Timeslip to 1992, where she is raised by her mother's younger self. Early episodes play up the ...
Langford, David
(1953- ) UK author, critic, editor, publisher and sf fan, in the latter capacity recipient of 21 Hugo awards for fan writing – some of the best of his several hundred pieces are assembled as Let's Hear It for the Deaf Man (coll 1992 chap US; much exp vt The Silence of the Langford 1996; exp 2015 ebook) as Dave Langford, edited by Ben Yalow – plus five Best Fanzine Hugos ...