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Tuesday 14 April 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 14 April 2026
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Watson, Ian
(1943-2026) UK teacher and author who lectured in English in Tanzania (1965-1967) and Tokyo (1967-1970) before beginning to publish sf with "Roof Garden Under Saturn" for New Worlds in 1969; he then taught Future Studies for six years at Birmingham Polytechnic, taking there one of the first academic courses in sf in the UK; he became a full-time writer in 1976, publishing around 200 short stories since 1969 at a gradually increasing tempo and with visibly ...
Skyhook
US Fanzine edited by Redd Boggs (1921-1996); also known as Sky Hook. Twenty-five issues, quarterly although with irregularities, from Winter 1948 to Autumn 1957. Of particular note was the "Pro-Phile" critical column by James Blish writing as William Atheling Jr, launched in issue 15 (Autumn 1952): these essays made up the bulk of Blish's first book of sf criticism, The Issue at Hand (coll 1964) as by William ...
Fantasy [magazines]
Title used on two early UK sf magazines. / 1. UK Pulp magazine published by George Newnes Ltd, edited by T Stanhope Sprigg (1903-1977) as a companion to his highly successful Air Stories. It saw three undated issues released in Summer 1938 and Spring and Summer 1939. Its material, though now badly dated, was typical of the stereotypical pulp fiction of the day and included work by John Beynon Harris (see John ...
Jakes, John
(1932-2023) US author initially best known for sf and fantasy, under his own name and various pseudonyms including Alan Henry, Jacob Johns, Alan Payne, Jay Scotland and Alan Wilder, before launching his Bicentennial series of novels, which traces the fictional history of a US family over the past 200 years. It achieved extraordinary bestsellerdom, undoubtedly justifying, at least financially, his decision to retire from the genre. Most of his shorter work, beginning with "The Dreaming ...
Mad Monster, The
Film (1942). Producers Releasing Corporation. Produced by Sigmund Neufeld. Directed by Sam Newfield. Written by Fred Myton. Cast includes Gordon De Main, Johnny Downs, Anne Nagel, Glenn Strange, Robert Strange and George Zucco. 77 minutes. Black and white. / Somewhere in southeastern US swamplands Dr Lorenzo Cameron (Zucco) conducts experiments to turn humans into animal-men, here a type of Werewolf. His mentally handicapped groundskeeper Petro ...
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 ...