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Monday 14 July 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 7 July 2025
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Drinkard, William H
(? - ) US politician (serving in the Alabama Senate 1978-1990), real estate developer and author of the sf novel Elom (2008), in which it is discovered that the eponymous planet is a kind of experimental Zoo where samples of various species – including Homo sapiens – have been abducted (see UFOs) from their native environments and left to evolve, under strictly controlled ...
Sharp, Robert George
(1908-1987) UK author, initially of crime thrillers under his own name, two of these – The Cry from the Ether (1934) and Horror Castle (1936) – being of some genre interest. Most of his later work was relatively routine sf as by Jon J Deegan, (possibly a House Name, though Sharp may have used the name exclusively), initially for the Old Growler series, Reconnoitre Krellig II ...
Oshikawa Shunrō
Pseudonym of Japanese author Masa'ari Oshikawa (1876-1914), whose Young Adult tales of aristocratic heroes, oceanic Robinsonades and plucky inventors were a crucial element of the Japanese zeitgeist in the Edwardian era. / Oshikawa's stories were leavened with speculative machinery, soaring martial fervour, and a sense of Japan's manifest destiny (see Imperialism). His ...
Pianeta degli Uomini Spenti, Il
["The Planet of Extinct Men"] Film (1961; vt Battle of the Worlds; vt Planet of the Lifeless Men; vt Guerre Planetari, 1978). Ultra Film/Sicilia Cinematografica/Topaz. Directed by Antonio Margheriti credited as Anthony Dawson. Written by Vassily Petrov. Cast includes Maya Brent, Bill Carter, Jacqueline Derval, Umberto Orsini and Claude Rains. 94 minutes, cut to 84 minutes. Colour. / Earth is threatened by a rogue planet, "The Outsider", which is not only ...
Wipeout
Videogame (1995). Psygnosis. Designed by Nick Burcombe. Platforms: DOS, PS1, Win (1995); Saturn (1996). / Wipeout is a racing game (see Videogames) set in the mid-twenty-first century, in which players compete for first place using Antigravity vehicles in tightly enclosed tracks. The gameplay is often frenetic, combining strikingly rapid movement through a variety of ...
Robinson, Roger
(1943- ) UK computer programmer, bibliographer and publisher, active in UK Fandom for many years. The Writings of Henry Kenneth Bulmer (1983 chap; rev 1984 chap) is an exhaustive Bibliography of one of the most prolific sf writers, Kenneth Bulmer, and Who's Hugh?: An SF Reader's Guide to Pseudonyms (1987) is similarly exhaustive in its ...