SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 17 February 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 16 February 2026
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
McIntyre, Ken
(1911-1968) UK artist, active and popular in British Fandom from 1952; best known for his professional contributions to Nebula Science Fiction from 1953 to 1957, comprising four colourful though perhaps not greatly sophisticated front covers depicting planetary landscapes with Spaceships, Robots or Aliens, and one space-themed back cover in ...
Cournos, John
(1881-1966) Working name, seemingly legalized, of Russian-born translator, anthologist, poet and author Igor Grigorievich Korshun, which Cournos preferred to render as Johann Gregorevich Korshun to accord more closely to his Ukrainian background; in US or UK from around 1891, in US from 1931. He is of some sf interest for London Under the Bolsheviks: A Londoner's Dream on Returning from Petrograd (1919 chap), which describes ...
Robotics
Term coined by Isaac Asimov in "Liar!" (May 1941 Astounding) to describe the then imaginary science and Technology of Robot design and manufacture, as governed by the Laws of Robotics. The word was generally adopted and has entered the English language. [DRL]
Corpse Vanishes, The
US film (1942; vt The Case of the Missing Brides). Banner Productions. Directed by Wallace Fox. Written by Harvey Gates from a story by Sam Robins and Gerald Schnitzer. Cast includes Tristram Coffin, Bela Lugosi, Frank Moran, Angelo Rossitto, Elizabeth Russell, Minerva Urecal and Luana Walters. 63 minutes. Black and white. / As she says "I do," a bride collapses and is declared dead; the mortuary staff arrive, to be told the body has already ...
Moren, Dan
(? - ) US editor, podcaster and author, all of whose fiction – comprising his first novel, The Caledonian Gambit (2017), plus the multi-story Simon Kovalic/Galactic Cold War Space Opera sequence beginning with The Bayern Agenda (2019) – features the same tough operative whose remit is to monitor and fend off the Illyrican Empire, against the threat it poses to heat up the ...
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 ...