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Friday 13 March 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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Dyson Sphere
Item of sf/scientific Terminology named for a concept put forward by the physicist Freeman J Dyson. According to Dyson, the logical power source for a sufficiently advanced galactic civilization would derive from the reconstruction of its solar system into an artificial biosphere completely enclosing – and thus trapping the maximum possible energy output from – the local sun. This original concept should more ...
Brooks, Walter R
(1886-1958) US journalist and author, active from 1915, publishing at least 200 stories by 1944, and including a nonfiction stint with the New Yorker 1932-1933. His most obvious success during these years was the Mr Ed sequence of twenty-three tales about a talking horse and his drunken owner, beginning with "The Talking Horse" (18 September 1937 Liberty), some of them assembled as The Original Mr Ed (coll 1963); the Television ...
Harrison, Eva
(? -? ) UK author whose first book, The Story of a Soul's Unfoldment (1905), describes the author's psychic communication with a Ancient Egyptian Priest. Of some sf interest is Wireless Messages from Other Worlds (1915), which contains a range of "spirit" (hence wireless) messages from other planets of the Solar System, giving details of higher forms of life. ...
Drugs
The use of drugs, both real and imaginary, is a common theme in sf, notably in Cyberpunk. The topic is discussed in some detail under Perception, and a little under New Wave and Psychology. Film and television treatments of the theme include Altered States (1980), Doomwatch (1970-1972), ...
Harbottle, Philip
(1941- ) UK local government officer and sf researcher. Harbottle is the world authority on the works of John Russell Fearn (whom see for details of Harbottle's involvement in his posthumous career) whose literary estate he represents and with whom he has posthumously collaborated, completing several stories. His bibliographical study of Fearn is John Russell Fearn – an Evaluation (1963 chap; exp vt ...
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 ...