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Monday 13 January 2025
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for the masthead; here for 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.
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Dent, Lester
(1904-1959) US author who began publishing work of genre interest with "Pirate Cay" for Top Notch Magazine in 1929; best known for his Doc Savage novels, which he created in 1933 and wrote for Doc Savage magazine under the House Name Kenneth Robeson (which see for full description); Dent wrote solo all but 43 of the 181 issues. He also wrote stories under his own name and ...
Allan, Mabel Esther
(1915-1998) UK author, mostly of tales for children and romances, active from the early 1930s, who also wrote as by Jean Estorel, Priscilla Hagen, Kathleen M Pearcey and Anne Pilgrim; her work for children shows the influence of the author and educational philosopher A S Neill. She is of sf interest for Time to Go Back (1972), whose protagonist uses a form of Time Travel to experience her family's ordeal in ...
Hinge, Mike
(1931-2003) New Zealand designer and illustrator, in US from around 1958 (his return to New Zealand in 1984 was brief), gaining considerable success for his early non-genre work, including two covers for Time Magazine (the emperor Hirohito, October 1971; President Nixon, November 1973). A "cryogenic module", commissioned by Stanley Kubrick to publicize 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), was never assembled. ...
Stoddard, James
(? - ) US author whose complex Science Fantasy High House sequence, comprising The High House (1998) and The False House (1999), centres on the eponymous house (and its imitation) which may be sentient, certainly accesses a number of Dimensions, and serves as the focus of a battle between the forces of Order and Chaos. The High House won a ...
Prince of Darkness
Film (1987). Alive. Directed by John Carpenter. Written by Martin Quatermass (Carpenter). Cast includes Lisa Blount, Jameson Parker, Donald Pleasence and Victor Wong. 101 minutes. Colour. / An old priest, guardian of a vat containing Satan as a green liquid, dies. Young physicists are brought to the derelict church by another worried priest (Pleasence) to analyse the strange powers here. The church is surrounded by bag ladies and vagrants (one being ...
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 ...