SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Sunday 16 November 2025
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 10 November 2025
Sponsor of the day: John Howard
Argosy, The
US Magazine established by Frank A Munsey and historically important as the first ever Pulp magazine when it changed format (October 1896) and switched to pulp paper (December 1896). It was published weekly from 9 December 1882 as The Golden Argosy, became The Argosy from 1 December 1888, went monthly April 1894-September 1917, then weekly, as Argosy Weekly, 6 October 1917 to 17 July ...
Valentine, Victor
(1918-1976) Australian author, in the UK for many years from 1950, whose Cure for Death (1960) features a Ray that not only cures cancer and ageing (see Immortality) but also dissociates its patients from their own past lives in a kind of Memory Edit. [JC]
Johns, Kenneth
Pseudonym used for collaborations between Kenneth Bulmer and John Newman on a long series of science-fact articles for New Worlds and Nebula Science Fiction 1955-1961. [JC]
Howard, Robin G
(1939- ) UK author of the Jim Long sequence of Space Opera adventures for Young Adult readers, comprising Jim Long – Space Agent – Ancient Ones of Light (1994), White Hole: Jim Long – Space Agent (2000), Soulgate: Temple of Souls (2006), Divine Fanaticism (2010) and Battle of the Archangel (2012 ebook), plus the ...
Swan Yankee Magazine
UK slim Pulp magazine, published by G G Swan, London. There were three sf and three weird-fiction issues in the series. The sf numbers were #3 (1941), #11 (1942) and #21 (1942), the weird numbers #6 (1942), #14 (1942) and #19 (1942). Despite the title, Swan Yankee Magazine contained mostly original UK stories, by Pauline Ashwell, W P Cockroft, Gerald Evans and ...
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 ...