SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Saturday 7 February 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 6 February 2026
Sponsor of the day: Paul Giamatti
Sallis, James
(1944-2026) US musician, poet and author, briefly active in New Worlds during its Michael Moorcock-directed New-Wave phase; he began to publish work of genre interest in this context with "Kazoo" (August 1967 New Worlds) and co-edited the magazine 1968-1969. His clearly acknowledged models in the French avant garde and the gnomic brevity of much of his work ...
Gojira [music]
French metal band formed in 1996, until 2001 under the name Godzilla (see Gojira), by guitarist and vocalist Joe Duplantier (1976- ), guitarist Christian Andreu (1976- ), bassist Jean-Michel Labadie (1974- ) and drummer Mario Duplantier (1981- ). The excellent From Mars to Sirius (2003) is a concept album following an exodus to space ...
King, John Robert
(1948- ) UK author whose Bruno Lipshitz and the Disciples of Dogma (1976) rather uneasily juggles a number of ingredients in a complex plot: an Alien invasion, a strange Religion, interpersonal conflicts and dollops of adventure. [JC]
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 ...
Malme, Arvid
(1943-1993) Norwegian teacher, painter and author. His first published sf story "Lampen lyser for deg" ["The Lamp Shines For You"] (1972 Science Fiction Magasinet #3-#4; see Nova – Fantastiske Fortellinger) was followed by works in Nova included in his only book of genre interest Dakrons bok: Boschiana ["The Book of Dakron: Boshiana"] (coll 1978). The storyteller is visiting the studio ...
Clute, John
(1940- ) Canadian critic, editor and author, in the UK from 1969; married to Judith Clute from 1964, partner of Elizabeth Hand since 1996. He began to publish work of genre interest with an sf-tinged poem "Carcajou Lament" in Triquarterly for Winter 1960 [ie Autumn 1959]; he began consistently publishing sf reviews in his "New Fiction" column for the Toronto Star (1966-1967), and later in ...