SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Sunday 9 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 3 August 2026
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Nasir, Jamil
(1955- ) US author who began publishing work of genre interest with "The Darkness Beyond" for Aboriginal Science Fiction (May-June 1988); his first novel, Quasar (1995), establishes a sometimes foggy relationship between lucid dream states and the external Perception (and manipulation) of reality. As usual in tales of this sort, Metaphysics tends to complicate ...
Thing, The
1. Film (1951; vt The Thing from Another World). Winchester Pictures/RKO. Directed by Christian Nyby (but see below). Written by Charles Lederer, based on "Who Goes There?" (August 1938 Astounding) by Don A Stuart (John W Campbell Jr). Cast includes James Arness, Robert Cornthwaite, Margaret Sheridan, Douglas Spencer and Kenneth Tobey. 86 minutes. Black and white. / The Thing was by far the most ...
Wilcox, Ronald
(? - ) Author whose single sf novel for Robert Hale Limited is The Centre of the Wheel (1981). [DRL]
Jaeger, Muriel
(1892-1969) UK author who took an English degree at Oxford and was a member there of a group of women writers, including Dorothy L Sayers (1893-1957), which called itself the Mutual Admiration Society. Her first sf work, The Question Mark (1926), depicts a Utopian UK of 200 years hence – as witnessed by the protagonist, who has been roused from a cataleptic trance (see Sleeper Awakes) – is a ...
Tomb Mold
Canada death metal band formed in Toronto in 2016 by guitarists Derek Vella and Payson Power, and drummer and vocalist Max Klebanoff. Their album Planetary Clairvoyance (2019) is a collection of Horror-In-SF themed songs, forming an overarching concept about the end of life across the universe. This can be due to "cosmic radiance" as on "Beg for Life", or an "alien hybrid designed to decimate" on "Infinite Resurrection". ...
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 ...