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Wednesday 22 April 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 20 April 2026
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Watson, Ian
(1943-2026) UK teacher and author who lectured in English in Tanzania (1965-1967) and Tokyo (1967-1970) before beginning to publish sf with "Roof Garden Under Saturn" for New Worlds in 1969; he then taught Future Studies for six years at Birmingham Polytechnic, taking there one of the first academic courses in sf in the UK; he became a full-time writer in 1976, publishing around 200 short stories since 1969 at a gradually increasing tempo and with visibly ...
Peck, Richard E
(1936- ) US author and academic and university administrator, an active critic of both literature in general and sf in particular. He began publishing sf with "In Alien Waters" in Venture for November 1969. His sf novel, Final Solution (1973), is an amusing but grim tale in which a US academic is sent fifty years into the future (through Cryonics) to find universities and ...
Orton, Hugh
(? -? ) UK author of fiction for boys, seemingly active only in the mid-1920s; The King of Chaos (10 May-12 July 1924 Pluck as "Fangs of the Unknown"; 1927 chap), set in a 1950 Future War, pits a lad against a Villain who threatens Britain. [JC/RR] see also: Boys' Friend Library; Boys' Papers. / ...
Animaniacs
1. US animated tv series (1993-1998; vt Steven Spielberg Presents Animaniacs). Amblin Entertainment, Warner Bros. Animation. Created by Tom Ruegger. Executive producer Steven Spielberg. Directors include Alfred Gimeno, Dave Marshall and Rusty Mills. Writers include Peter Hastings, Nicholas Hollander, Randy Rogel, Paul Rugg and Sherri Stoner. Voice cast includes Jess Harnell, Tress MacNeille, Rob Paulsen and Sherri Stoner. 99 21-minute ...
Crossen, Kendell Foster
(1910-1981) US author and editor, active under various names in various Pulp-magazine markets, perhaps most notably as an author of detective stories, his best work being published under his own name and (more successfully) as M E Chaber. The Green Lama series of thrillers (in Double Detective from 1940), as by Richard Foster, gives off fantastic-Pulp-magazine emanations reminiscent of Doc Savage, as the Green Lama himself ...
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 ...