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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 ...
Mars
For a long time Mars seemed to be the most likely abode for life outside the Earth, and for that reason it has always been of cardinal importance in sf. Its surface, unlike that of Venus, exhibits markings that have for a long time been visible (albeit unclearly) with the aid of optical telescopes, and has a distinct red colour. Early observers interpreted what they saw in terms of analogies with terrestrial phenomena: blue-green tracts interrupting the red were ...
Pogue, Bill
(1930-2014) US Skylab astronaut and author, whose The Trikon Deception (1992) with Ben Bova, a Near Future tale set on a vast orbiting satellite where scientists employed by various private corporations are ostensibly united in an attempt to work out a technological fix to save the planet, which is decaying rapidly through Ecological degradation; but conflicts soon ensue. [JC]
Pedler, Kit
Working name of UK author and scientist Christopher Magnus Howard Pedler (1927-1981). He was a medical doctor, practising from 1953 for about three years, after which he began the research into the experimental pathology of eye disease that resulted in a second doctorate; from his early years he was a passionate advocate for the proper conservation of the planet. In collaboration with Gerry Davis he created the menacing Cybermen for the ...
Moore, David A
(1814-? ) US author of The Age of Progress: Or, a Panorama of Time, in Four Visions (1856), a composite volume in which essays in Biblical typology are set against assays into Future History: for instance, Part One depicts the world of 3000 CE specifically as Eden reborn. [JC]
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 ...