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Friday 13 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.
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Carver, Jeffrey A
(1949-2026) US author who began publishing sf with "... Of No Return" in Fiction Magazine for 1974. His first novel, Seas of Ernathe (1976), which serves as an introduction to the loose Star Rigger sequence of Space Operas, showed early signs of a love of plot and thematic complexity which would take him some time, and several novels, to control. The continuation, Star Rigger's Way (1978), for instance, combines quest ...
Croft, Herbert
(1751-1816) UK barrister, lexicographer and author, best known for a nonfantastic roman à clef, Love and Madness (1780). He is of sf interest for the Kilkhampton series of Satirical sketches beginning with The Abbey of Kilkhampton; Or, Monumental Records for the Year 1980 (1780) [for further details see Checklist below]. Not specifically tied to this sequence, The Wreck of Westminster Abbey, Alias the Year 2000 ...
Tarzan
This potent twentieth-century myth, created by Edgar Rice Burroughs in Tarzan of the Apes (October 1912 All-Story; 1914), may seem only marginally sf on the strength of the detail that Tarzan – who is both Lord Greystoke, scion of English aristocracy, and Pastoral lord of the African jungle – was raised by great apes (see ...
Columbia Workshop
Radio series (1936-1943; 1946-1947). CBS Radio for CBS Radio Network. Producers included Nila Mack and William N Robson. Directors included Irving Reis (1906-1953), Earle MacGill, Robson, Myron Sattler (?1907-?1981), Nila Mack, others. Staff writers included Stephen Vincent Benét, Richard Hughes, Vic Knight, Reis and Robson. Several hundred 60-minute episodes were produced, some as two-part serials. At ...
Taylor, Bert Leston
(1866-1921) US editor, columnist, poet and author, some of whose tales move into the fantastic, but usually to spoof targets of his mild Satire. He is most famous for his A Line o' Type or Two column for the Chicago Tribune from 1901 until his death. Of his short fiction, "The Caves of Fire" (May 1898 Black Cat) with Edward Ward describes the Invention of an electrical device which, passed through glass, is capable of ...
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 ...