SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 10 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 9 February 2026
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
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 ...
Doomsday Machine
Film (1972; vt Escape from Planet Earth). First Leisure/Cine-Find. Produced by Harry Hope. Directed by Herbert J Leder, Hope and Lee Sholem. Written by Stuart J Byrne from his original story. Special effects partially by David L Hewitt. Cast includes Ruta Lee, Denny Miller, Mala Powers, Lori Scott, unknown, Bobby Van, Henry Wilcoxon and Grant Williams. 83 minutes. Colour. / Project Astra is a two-year ...
Shinjō Kazuma
(? - ) Japanese author whose early success came in 1991 with a Tie to a Play-by-Mail game: Hōrai Gakuen ["Penglai Academy"] set at a huge, 100,000-strong school of duellists and schemers, itself on an offshore island that takes its name from that of the "isles of the immortals" in Chinese legend. His subsequent work has largely ...
Rohmer, Sax
Pseudonym of UK stage lyricist, journalist and author Arthur Henry Ward (1883-1959), who began calling himself Arthur Sarsfield Ward after his mother's death in 1901; he signed some early stories as A Sarsfield Ward, including his first work of genre interest, "The Mysterious Mummy" in Pearson's Weekly for the Christmas Issue, 24 November 1903. He also published various early work in Cassell's Magazine, Chambers Journal, ...
Lawrence, C E
(1870-1940) UK editor and author, of whose several novels, most of them fantasy, two are of sf interest: The Trial of Man: An Allegorical Romance (1902) anonymous, a mildly Equipoisal tale whose protagonist travels to the Moon and subsequently to heaven where the Angel Zuron assigns him a new planet where he breeds sinlessly with a new Eve (see Adam and Eve), but then fatally boasts of his ...
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 ...