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Tuesday 28 November 2023
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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Compton, D G
(1930-2023) UK author, born of parents who were both in the theatre; he increasingly lived in the USA after 1981. As Guy Compton, he published some unremarkable detective novels, beginning with Too Many Murderers (1962), and as by Frances Lynch produced some nonfantastic Gothics throughout his career; but soon turned to sf with tales almost always set in the Near Future, and anatomizing moral dilemmas within that arena: the future is very clearly ...
Yelverton, Christopher
Pseudonym of unidentified UK author (? -? ), who may or may not be related to the historical English political figures, Sir Christopher Yelverton (1536-1612) and his grandson, Sir Christopher Yelverton, 1st Baronet (? -1654). The dreaming protagonist of Oneiros; Or, Some Questions of the Day (1889) finds himself translated a millennium hence to another planet (see Life on Other Worlds), ...
Cameron, Verney Lovett
(1844-1894) UK naval officer, explorer and author; after Henry Stanley had found David Livingstone in central Africa (and lost him), Cameron mounted a second expedition, which found the explorer's body. He was subsequently the first European to cross Africa east to west. In contemporary terms, his explorations were comparatively enlightened: he did not shoot animals, except for food; and he did not murder Africans. Most of his early work consists of nonfiction descriptions of his travels; after ...
Arrivo di Wang, L'
["The Arrival of Wang"] Italian film (2011). Manetti Bros, Iris Film. Directed by Antonio Manetti and Marco Manetti. Written by Antonio Manetti and Marco Manettii. Cast includes Francesca Cuttica, Ennio Fantastichini, Juliet Esey Joseph and Li Yong. 83 minutes. Colour. / Film translator Gaia (Cuttica) is drafted to interpret at the interrogation of "Mr Wang" (Li Yong), an illegal immigrant soon revealed as an Alien, who has learned ...
Fox, Mary
(1798-1864) UK author, an illegitimate daughter of King William IV (1765-1837); Richard Whately (1787-1863), the Archbishop of Dublin, may have written most of the Proto SF novel initially attributed mainly to her. Account of an Expedition (Planned and Conducted by Mr H Sibthorpe) to the Interior of New Holland (1837; rev vt The Southlanders: An Account of an Expedition to the Interior of New Holland 1860), neither edition credited on ...
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 ...