SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 11 August 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 10 August 2026
Sponsor of the day: The Telluride Institute
Crowley, John
(1942-2026) US teacher and author who also worked in documentary films and television for some time beginning in 1966. His sf novels have had a considerable impact on the field, and his fantasies established him as a figure whose work courteously but deeply stretched the boundaries of genre literature. / His first novel, The Deep (1975), is set on a flat discworld resting on a pillar that extends beyond measurement into the circumambient galactic Deep, in which very few stars ...
Jones, Claude P
(1870-1945) US physician and author of a Near Future adventure, Banduk Jaldi Banduk! (Quick My Rifle!) (1907; vt The Countersign: A Story of Tibet 1909) with A L Sykes, whose American-born heroine, believing herself to be a reincarnation of Kubla Khan, frees Tibet from China with the help of an amorous American who arrives by Balloon. [JC]
Minor, John W
Pseudonym of US author George Lynde Catlin (1840-1896), who specialized in nonfiction, much of it devoted to various railways and railroads. "Bietigheim" (1886) as by John W Minor is a Future War tale set in 1890-1891 between the US and her allies and Germany and hers. Germany loses, and by 1910 republics – on the model of the United States of America – have replaced the old monarchies throughout Europe (see ...
Murphy, Patrick D
(? - ) US author, editor and academic critic, Professor of English at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, who began to publish work of genre interest with "Mythic and Fantastic: Gary Snyder's 'Mountains and Rivers without End'" in Extrapolation for Winter 1985, and has also appeared in The New York Review of Science Fiction and ...
Joseph, M K
(1914-1981) UK-born poet, author and professor of English, in New Zealand from 1924; his first novels were not sf. The Hole in the Zero (1967) begins as an apparently typical Space-Opera adventure into further dimensions at the edge of the Universe, but quickly reveals itself as a linguistically brilliant, complex exploration of the nature of the four personalities involved as they begin out of their own resources to ...
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 ...