SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Sunday 1 December 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.
Site updated on 1 December 2024
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
Wilson, Miles
(1706-1776) UK author, curate and schoolmaster in Halton Gill, Littondale, Yorkshire, who wrote and published the Proto SF narrative The History of Israel Jobson, the Wandering Jew [for subtitle see Checklist] (1757 chap) as by M W, as a device for teaching his young pupils about astronomy. This story takes the titular Wandering Jew character – a cobbler – on an angelically mediated ...
Leigh, Lora
Pseudonym of US author of erotic romances Christine Simmons (1965- ). Of sf interest is the Feline Breeds sequence, beginning with Tempting the Beast (2003), in which a Cat-like male – part of a Near Future programme in the Genetic Engineering of elite forces – encounters a sexually aroused woman reporter (see Sex; ...
Barr, Ken
(1933-2016) Working name of American artist Kenneth Barr, born in Scotland, who used the name Kenneth Barr for his early work in Britain. After military service he relocated to London to launch a career as a commercial artist and briefly worked for the British magazine Nebula Science Fiction, contributing three undistinguished covers and numerous interior illustrations; he also drew for a British Comic book, D C Thomson's ...
Jerome, Jerome K
(1859-1927) UK author and editor best known for humorous writing, in particular the classic Thames-centred boating travelogue Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) (1889). He is of sf interest as editor of The Idler (which see) from its launch in February 1892, initially with the owner Robert Barr as co-editor and solo from August 1895 until his resignation in November 1897. In addition, he wrote a few ...
Gilman, Carolyn Ives
(1954- ) US historian and author whose nonfiction works, beginning with The Northern Expeditions of Stephen H. Long (1978) with Lucile M Kane and June D Holmquist, focus on the exploration and history of the American Mid West, and who began publishing work of genre interest with "The Trial of Victor Genovese" for Tales of the Unanticipated, Fall 1986, soon establishing a reputation for cognitively challenging work, often from a standpoint of a late, ...
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 ...