SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Friday 18 April 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 14 April 2025
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Incredible Petrified World, The
Film (1957). GBM Productions/Governor Productions. Produced and directed by Jerry Warren. Written by John W Steiner. Underwater photography by Mel Fisher. Cast includes Maurice Bernard, John Carradine, Robert Clarke, Phyllis Coates, Sheila Noonan and Allen Windsor. 70 minutes, cut to 64 minutes for home video release. / Professor Millard Wyman (Carradine) has developed an experimental diving bell capable of reaching greater depths Under the Sea than ...
Violet Evergarden
Japanese animated tv series (2018). Kyoto Animation. Based on the Light Novel by Kana Akatsuki (author) and Akiko Takas (illustrator). Directed by Taichi Ishidate. Written by Reiko Yoshida. Voice cast includes Yui Ishikawa, Hidenobu Kiuchi, Takehito Koyasu, Daisuke Namikawa. Thirteen broadcast 24-minute episodes, plus one OVA. Colour. / Violet Evergarden (Ishikawa) was a teenaged soldier in a recently concluded ...
Hoyle, Fred
(1915-2001) UK astronomer and author, famed in the former capacity for his maverick views on many subjects, including a long-held advocacy of the Steady State Universe theory that the Universe had been in a state of constant creation for ever (see Continuous Creation), a concept replaced after much acrimony by the universally preferred Big Bang theory advocated by George Gamow and others (Hoyle in fact coined the term ...
Samalman, Alexander
(1904-1956) US author and editor who, after many years with Standard Magazines, became in 1954 editor of their sf journals, Thrilling Wonder Stories, Fantastic Story Magazine (see Fantastic Story Quarterly) and Startling Stories, the first two of which were soon amalgamated with the latter, though to little avail, for it folded before the end of 1955. Relatively little of ...
Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers
Board and counter Wargame (1976). Avalon Hill. Designed by Randall Reed. / Starship Troopers is a simulation of the fictional reality depicted in Robert A Heinlein's 1959 Military SF novel of the same name. Its gameplay concentrates on what has perhaps proved to be the most influential feature of the book, despite its enthusiastic political evangelism: infantry combat between ...
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 ...