SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Monday 19 January 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 January 2026
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von Däniken, Erich
(1935-2026) Swiss author of a series of purportedly nonfiction books, beginning with Erinnerungen an die Zukunft (1968; trans Michael Heron as Chariots of the Gods? 1969), which, based on a mass of often suspect and internally inconsistent data, argues that the Earth was visited by at least one Alien spacefaring race before and at the dawn of historical time; thus, for example, the Great Pyramid of ...
Adams, Scott
(1957-2026) US author and cartoonist best known for the Dilbert strip published from 1989, which when at its best superbly (in terms of concept and accuracy of Satire rather than quality of drawing) satirized contemporary office life and corporate incompetence. As with most ambitious modern comic strips, it segues frequently into sf and fantasy tropes – such as Robot office workers, wish-fulfilling ...
Gould, F Carruthers
(1844-1925) UK stockbroker, illustrator, editor and author, creator of a large number of amiably satirical political cartoons from about 1879 up to the beginning of World War One, retiring in 1914 from the Westminster Gazette, which he had helped found, and where he published (and illustrated) the first work of authors like Saki, whose sketches for the paper were assembled as The Westminster Alice (coll 1902). His political cartoons, which appeared ...
Cousins, E G
(1893-1996) Chinese-born author, in UK from an early age, in active service during World War One; he began publishing the detective fiction for which he is remembered in 1950. His Near Future tale, "I Will Not Cease" (1933), depicts an England confusedly caught in the trammels of a savage War. [JC]
Schealer, John M
(1920-2008) US businessman and author whose Zip-Zip sequences, beginning with Zip-Zip and His Flying Saucer (1956), offers Space Opera adventures for younger readers; Mars and Venus are visited harmlessly. The Sycamore Warrior: A Mystery of Ancient Egypt (1960) verges on the fantastic in its depiction of the effects of a mysterious statue on two young protagonists, one from ...
Robinson, Roger
(1943- ) UK computer programmer, bibliographer and publisher, active in UK Fandom for many years. The Writings of Henry Kenneth Bulmer (1983 chap; rev 1984 chap) is an exhaustive Bibliography of one of the most prolific sf writers, Kenneth Bulmer, and Who's Hugh?: An SF Reader's Guide to Pseudonyms (1987) is similarly exhaustive in its ...