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Friday 13 March 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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Barillet-Lagargousse
Pseudonym of the unidentified French author (? -? ) of a Future War novel, La guerre final, histoire fantastique (1885; trans Brian Stableford as The Final War: A Fantastic Story coll 2014), whose name on the title page is expanded to Barillet-Lagargousse, Ingénieur destructeur ["Engineer of Destruction"]. The English translation also includes a ...
Science Fiction Foundation
UK research unit set up in 1971 at the North East London Polytechnic (which became the University of East London in 1992), but semi-autonomous, being controlled by a council, partly academics and partly sf professionals, and including George Hay, whose enthusiasm had much to do with the SFF's inception. Peter Nicholls, the first administrator (1971-1977), was followed by Malcolm Edwards ...
Chronomaster
Videogame (1995). DreamForge Entertainment. Designed by Roger Zelazny, Jane Lindskold. Platforms: DOS. / The graphical Adventure game Chronomaster was Roger Zelazny's last work. In a future galactic civilization, the creation of privately owned Pocket Universes has become a hobby ...
Scott-Moncrieff, D
(1907-1987) UK vintage car restorer and author, who hyphenated his surname for his books, which included some nonfiction. In Not for the Squeamish (coll 1948), the first of his two volumes of stories, of direct sf interest is "Count Szolnok's Robots", in which Robots are terminally evil, with several other tales edge into the realms of Gothic SF; his second collection, The Vaivaisukko's Bride (coll 1949 ...
Banville, Théodore de
(1823-1891) French poet and author, a formalist and symbolist involved in various literary controversies over the course of his forty-year career. His penetration of the veils of reality may not have been lastingly profound, but the modestly transgressive thrust of the tales assembled as Contes Féeriques (coll 1882; trans Brian Stableford as Magical Tales 2021) demonstrates a use of ...
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 ...