SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Thursday 24 April 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 21 April 2025
Sponsor of the day: John Howard
Broderick, Damien
(1944-2025) Australian author, editor and critic; he had a PhD in the semiotics of fiction, science and sf with special reference to the work of Samuel R Delany. He edited four anthologies of Australian sf: The Zeitgeist Machine (anth 1977), Strange Attractors (anth 1985), Matilda at the Speed of Light (anth 1988) and Centaurus: The Best of Australian Science Fiction (anth ...
Pešek, Luděk
(1919-1999) Czech artist and author, whose first novels (about social inequalities; not sf, but listed below for convenience) were published in Czechoslovakia in the late 1940s, but from 1968, after being exiled by the communist regime, he lived in Switzerland, his books being first published in German translation; they have been widely translated into other languages. His astronomical paintings are well known, and have been featured in National Geographic; one appeared as the cover art ...
Offworld
US Semiprozine published by Neil Feigeles of Graphic Image Press, edited by Arnaldo Lopez; two issues, Fall 1993 and Winter 1993/94. Published in slim standard format (10 x 6.7 in; 257 x 170 mm), saddled stapled, it was printed in an edition of 5,000 copies, on quality coated stock with colour artwork throughout its 64 pages. Offworld emerged from the comic-book world (see Comics) rather than a descent via the ...
Coffin, Bill
(1970- ) US author of two Young Adult novels: Overmind (1995), set some time into the future, in which a gladiator escapes his fate and tries to contact God (see Religion; Transcendence); and Prime Mover (1996), a Space Opera involving human-settled planets, war, and interfering Aliens. ...
Empire I
Board and counter Wargame (1973). Third Millenia (TM). Designed by William Gemmill, Randall Thomas. / Between the release of Lensman in 1969 and the start of the science fiction Wargame boom in 1974 with the publication of Starforce: Alpha Centauri and Stellar Conquest, several other games were created which modelled ...
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 ...