SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 15 July 2025
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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Naylor, Charles
(1941-2005) US editor and author, the partner of Thomas M Disch between 1969 and 2005. He wrote a gothic novel, Steps to the Grotto (1974) as by Cassandra Nye, echoing the Cassandra Knye pseudonym used earlier for gothics by Disch and John T Sladek. Under his own name, Neighboring Lives (1981) with Thomas M Disch is a non-sf ...
Reynolds, Alfred
(? - ) US author of Kiteman of Karanga (1985; vt Kiteman 1986), a Young Adult Planetary Romance set on Eftah, whose people are saved from the tyrannous lizard-riders known as the Hrithdon by the kite-rider Hero, young Karl, who is back from exile. [JC]
Matthews, Rodney
(1945- ) British illustrator. After he studied at the West of England College of Art from 1961 to 1962, Matthews initially worked in advertising, while also drumming for the rock group Squidd. In 1970, he left advertising to focus on doing art for album covers, which has remained one of his primary avocations; perhaps his best known effort in this area is his cover for Nazareth's No Mean City (1979), depicting a menacing humanoid monster on a barren ...
Barth, John
(1930-2024) US academic and author, one of the central fabulists (see Fabulation) of his generation of writers, noted for a sometimes relentless experimentalism, an inability or disinclination to seize upon the moment of story he famously articulated in "The Literature of Exhaustion" (August 1967 The Atlantic), where postmodern (see Postmodernism and SF) writers are presented as miming the genuine stories before ...
Freitas, Emilia
(1855-1908) Brazilian author whose work has been rediscovered and re-evaluated in recent decades after many years in obscurity. She wrote poetry and articles from an early age, and was very active in the literary life of Fortaleza, the capital of her native State of Ceará, collaborating in Magazines and newspapers, while earning her living as a teacher in public schools in Fortaleza and also in Manaus (the capital of Amazonas) ...
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 ...