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Sunday 7 December 2025
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 1 December 2025
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Stoppard, Tom
Working name of Czech-born playwright and screenwriter Tomáš Straussler (1937-2025), in the UK since 1946, the Stoppard surname being acquired from his stepfather when his widowed mother remarried in 1945. His early dramatic work was characterized by extravagant wit and wordplay, and an Absurdist application of logic to surreal or insane situations. Following the broadcast of several Radio plays, his ...
Warhammer 40,000
Miniature models-based Wargame (1987). Games Workshop (GW). Designed by Rick Priestley, Andy Chambers, Jervis Johnson, Gavin Thorpe, others. / While most tabletop Wargames have failed to compete against Videogames, Games Workshop's fantasy game Warhammer Fantasy Battle (1983 GW) designed by Bryan Ansell, Richard ...
Greenberg, Louis
(? - ) South African author, in UK for some years, much of whose work has been horror in collaboration with Sarah Lotz as by S L Grey. Selected titles (see Horror in SF) are listed below, in particular the Downside Trio beginning with The Mall (2011), whose two protagonists find themselves trapped in an Underground ...
Babits, Mihály
(1883-1941) Hungarian editor, translator (from English and German) and author, best known for his poetry, the finest example of which is probably the autobiographical Jönas konyve ["The Book of Jonah"] (1938). His sf novel, A Gólyakalifa ["The Caliph's Stork"] (1918; trans anon as The Nightmare 1966), is of interest in its depiction of a split personality. A utopian novel, ...
October, John
Pseudonym of UK author Christopher Portway (1923-2009) whose sf novel for Robert Hale Limited, The Anarchy Pedlars (1976), is set in a Near Future world threatened by a revived cult of assassins. [JC]
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 ...