SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 20 January 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 19 January 2026
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
von Däniken, Erich
(1935-2026) Swiss author of a series of purportedly nonfiction books, beginning with Erinnerungen an die Zukunft (1968; trans Michael Heron as Chariots of the Gods? 1969), which, based on a mass of often suspect and internally inconsistent data, argues that the Earth was visited by at least one Alien spacefaring race before and at the dawn of historical time; thus, for example, the Great Pyramid of ...
Adams, Scott
(1957-2026) US author and cartoonist best known for the Dilbert strip published from 1989, which when at its best superbly (in terms of concept and accuracy of Satire rather than quality of drawing) satirized contemporary office life and corporate incompetence. As with most ambitious modern comic strips, it segues frequently into sf and fantasy tropes – such as Robot office workers, wish-fulfilling ...
Fifth Di ..., The
US low-paying Online Magazine which has been produced by a succession of publishers in various formats. It began as a slim, saddle-stapled, desk-top-published Digest magazine in September 1995, founded by James B Baker (1925-2002) and published bimonthly by Sam's Dot's predecessor company, Pro Mart Publishing, Carmichael, California. Baker wanted his publications to educate, and had Brian A Hopkins as science editor, but although ...
Shawl, Nisi
(1955- ) US editor, journalist and author who began publishing work of genre interest with "I Was a Teenage Genetic Engineer" as by Denise Angela Shawl in Semiotext(e) SF (anth 1989) edited by Rudy Rucker, Peter Lamborn Wilson and Robert Anton Wilson. They have focused throughout their career on short forms of fiction, a fair conspectus of ...
Dunsany, Lord
Working name of Irish playwright, poet, journalist and author Edward Plunkett (1878-1957), made Baron Dunsany on the death of his father in 1899, with almost all his work, from its beginnings in the 1890s, signed Lord Dunsany; in active service during World War One. Though primarily a writer of Fantasy, he is of sf interest through the widespread influence of his language and imagery, and through the spoof sf explanations 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 ...