SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Sunday 12 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 6 April 2026
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Pantell, Dora
(1915-1996) US teacher, technical writer and author of fiction for children, best known for her continuation of Ellen MacGregor's Miss Pickerell series of tales about Lavinia Pickerell, a highly adventurous New England spinster. Pantell wrote most her contributions as with MacGregor, who had left copious notes for continuations of the sequence, in which Pickerell applies her rigorous intellect to uncovering the scientific premises underlying ...
Taylor, William Alexander
(1837-1912) US lawyer, editor, politician and author whose Utopia, Intermere (1901), carries its protagonist into the heart of an inland sea perhaps adjacent to Antarctica; it is clearly Atlantis. Its inhabitants, who have deliberately kept the world at bay, communicate through Telepathy; they have evolved a civilization featuring advances in science and ...
Drigin, Serge
(1894-1977) Russian artist and illustrator, in active service during World War One, in UK from the early 1920s, who variously signed himself as Sergie, Sergey, S, S R, or Serge R Drigin; much of his early work appeared in various action magazines, his sf-related work appearing in Scoops, Fantasy, and elsewhere. For some years from around 1934, he drew Comics for ...
Ad Astra
UK magazine, in A4 format, published by Rowlot Ltd, edited by James Manning, 16 issues, bimonthly, October/November 1978 to September/October 1981, only first two issues dated. Its subtitle, "Britain's First ScienceFact/ScienceFiction Magazine", contained the seeds of its eventual demise: Ad Astra attempted to cover too many fields, most in no real depth. The fiction, about two stories an issue – mainly from UK authors, including John Brunner, ...
Beast Must Die, The
Film (1974; vt Black Werewolf). Amicus Productions and the British Lion Film Corporation. Directed by Paul Arnett. Written by Arnett (uncredited), Scott Finch (uncredited) and Michael Winder, based on "There Shall Be No Darkness" (April 1950 Thrilling Wonder Stories) by James Blish. Cast includes Tom Chadbon, Marlene Clark, Peter Cushing, Anton Diffring, Charles Gray, Michael Gambon, Calvin Lockhart and Ciaran Madden. 93 ...
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 ...