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Saturday 27 July 2024
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for the masthead; here for 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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Arthur C Clarke Award
This award has been given since 1987 for the best sf novel whose UK first edition was published during the previous calendar year, and consists of an inscribed bookend and a sum of money from a grant initially donated by Arthur C Clarke. In 2001 the prize money – until then a constant £1000 – was increased to £2001 as a gesture to 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968); it has since risen by ...
Raven, Simon
(1927-2001) UK author best known for his Alms for Oblivion sequence, which bracingly deprecates almost all aspects of twentieth century British civilian and military life; the third volume of the sequence, The Sabre Squadron (1966), slides close to sf. None of his work is of strong sf interest, though Brother Cain (1959) is about a Faustian bargain that verges on the supernatural, and Doctors Wear Scarlet (1960) hints at a rational cause for the ...
Miller, Joaquin
Pseudonym of US poet and author Cincinnatus Hiner Miller (1837-1913). Various birth dates have been suggested, but Miller was notoriously unreliable; we give here a current consensus. His adopted name (he said) was taken from Joaquin Murieta (?1829-1853), a famously legendary California desperado (who may have never in fact existed). Miller's poetry, which was nonfantastic, wears surprisingly well; he was active as a journalist from about 1862, making use – as did Ambrose ...
Ryner, Han
Pseudonym of Algerian-born French philosopher and author Jacques Élie Henri Ambroise Ner (1861-1938), which he adopted in 1898, after having published fairly widely under his own name. His philosophical position, as articulated in many articles and books, combined epicurean stoicism about the purpose of life with anarchist political views which led to his taking a pacifist stand in World War One, a position reflected in Les Pacifiques ["The ...
Cuba
Cuban sf is generally associated with its flourishing after the revolution of 1959, although the genre was already present in the island as early as 1875 with samples of the scientific novel. Francisco Calcagno (1827-1903) published the novel Historia de un muerto ["Story of a Dead Man"] (1875). Calcagno also published in 1888 En busca del eslabón: historia de monos ["Pursuing the Link: Story of Monkeys"] (1888). Some three decades later, the engineer Juan ...
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 ...