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Thursday 16 July 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.
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Panspermia
Panspermia is the speculative notion that life may spread around the universe via drifting seeds or spores that provide a starting-point for Evolution on planets. The concept is ancient, dating back to Anaxagoras (circa 500 BCE-428 BCE), but was revived by such scientists as Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894) and Svante Arrhenius (1859-1927), winner of the 1903 Nobel Prize for chemistry. Panspermia has been seriously elaborated upon by Fred ...
Pfeil, Donald J
(1937-1989) US author whose Voyage to a Forgotten Sun (1975), Through the Reality Warp (1976) and Look Back to Earth (1977) as Don Pfeil were Young Adult deliberately (and enjoyably) outmoded Space-Opera idiom. Under the House Name William Arrow he wrote Return to the Planet of the Apes 2: Escape from Terror Lagoon ...
Tregarron, Yate
Pseudonym of UK playwright and author Hilda C Adshead (?1901-?1985). The Idle Fairy (1926 chap), under her own name, is a children's fantasy; as Tregarron, she is of sf interest for Murderers' Island (1925), a Near Future tale in which murderers are banished to a penal Island (see Crime and Punishment; Prisons). [JC]
Contract
Russian animated film (1985; original title Kontrakt). Soyuzmultfilm. Directed by Vladimir Tarasov. Written by Viktor Slavkin, based on Robert Silverberg's "Company Store" (in Star Science Fiction Stories 5, anth 1959, ed Frederik Pohl). Voice cast includes Aleksandr Kaydanovskiy and Evgeniy Steblov. 10 minutes. Colour. / ...
Colladay, Morrison
Working name for most of his fiction of Charles Morrison Colladay (1877-? ), US publisher, salesman and author who is discussed in E F Bleiler's Science Fiction: The Gernsback Years (1998). "Spirit Trails" (January 1928 Ghost Stories) as Charles Colladay may be his first story. In When the Moon Fell (1929 chap) illustrated by Frank R Paul, 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 ...