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Thursday 16 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 ...
Gunn, Neil M
(1891-1973) Scottish author and civil servant who served in various combat-related functions with the Customs and Excise during World War One; author of many novels, the first being Grey Coast (1926). This and some others – like Morning Tide (1931), The Lost Glen (1932), Second Sight (1940) and The Silver Bough (1948) – contain fantasy elements of interest, reminiscent at times ...
Hunger, Anna
(? - ) US author of The Man Who Lived Forever (March 1938 Astounding as "The Master Shall Not Die!" as by R DeWitt Miller alone; exp 1956 dos; vt Year 3097 1958) with R DeWitt Miller, in which humanity an aeon hence is pitted against the machine (see Immortality; ...
Collyn, George
Pseudonym used for short sf by UK author Colin Pilkington (1937-2002), whose work mostly appeared in New Worlds, plus one story in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. [DRL] see also: Sun. /
Wilson, G Willow
(1982- ) US author whose first works were Graphic Novels, beginning with the Young Adult Cairo: A Graphic Novel (graph 2007), a tale which incorporates aspects of her own life story – she converted to Islam while teaching in Cairo during 2003 – into contemporary Urban Fantasy [see The Encyclopedia of Fantasy under links ...
Nicholls, Peter
(1939-2018) Australian editor and author, primarily a critic and historian of sf through his creation and editing of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction [see below]; resident in the UK 1970-1988, in Australia from 1988; worked as an academic in English literature (1962-1968, 1971-1977), scripted television documentaries, was a Harkness Fellow in Film-making (1968-1970) in the USA, worked as a publisher's editor (1982-1983), often broadcast film and book reviews on BBC Radio from 1974 and ...