SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Sunday 19 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 ...
O'Brien, Flann
Pseudonym of Irish author and civil servant Brian O'Nolan or Ó Nualláin (1911-1966), who also wrote – mainly for his 1940-1966 Irish Times newspaper column "Cruiskeen Lawn" ["The Little Overflowing Jug"] – as Myles na Gopaleen ["Myles of the Little Horses" or "Myles of the Ponies"], sometimes rendered Myles na gCopaleen. The Irish Times columns are classics of often fantastic Humour; various selections have been published [see ...
Huang Fan
Pseudonym of Huang Xiaozhong (1950- ) a Chinese author whose occasional experiments in sf, Equipoise and the absurd have made him a distinct and distinguished voice in modern Taiwanese fiction. A former engineer and factory manager, he turned to writing full-time in the 1980s, except for a prolonged hiatus from 1993-2003 when he was secluded in a Buddhist monastery. He came to prominence with the non-sf ...
Miss Fury
US Comic strip created, drawn and written by Tarpé Mills, real name June Tarpé Mills (1912-1988). Miss Fury was the first female Superhero created by a woman, introduced in a syndicated Sunday newspaper comic strip entitled The Black Fury on 6 April 1941; the strip and the heroine were retitled Miss Fury in November that year. The newspaper strip ran until 1952; eight comic books (1942-1946) were ...
Smith, William Augustus
(? -? ) US author of His Pseudoic Majesty; Or, the Knights of the Fleece (1903), a Near Future novel whose sf underpinnings – in the main an idealized description of a hierarchical America free of the depredations of capitalism – are obscured by the allegorical recounting of the tale. [JC]
Langford, David
(1953- ) UK author, critic, editor, publisher and sf fan, in the latter capacity recipient of 21 Hugo awards for fan writing – some of the best of his several hundred pieces are assembled as Let's Hear It for the Deaf Man (coll 1992 chap US; much exp vt The Silence of the Langford 1996; exp 2015 ebook) as Dave Langford, edited by Ben Yalow – plus five Best Fanzine Hugos ...