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Thursday 5 October 2023
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for the masthead; here for 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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Collins, Mortimer
(1827-1876) UK poet and author, moderately prolific in various genres; one collection of poetry, The Inn of Strange Meetings and Other Poems (coll 1871), contains Arthurian material. His three novels of sf interest are each of only tangential interest, but are good examples of how sf could be used in nineteenth-century Britain to avoid the implications of scientific discoveries like Evolution. Miranda: A Midsummer Madness (1873 3vols) ...
Gowing, Sidney
(1877-1943) UK author who also wrote as by David Goodwin, as by John Goodwin (who should be distinguished from the real John C Goodwin), and as by John Tregillis. Much of his work for the Boys' Papers appeared as single-issue tales (here treated as individual titles) in the Boys' Friend Library, either reprinted from earlier sources or original, beginning with the nonfantastic Man to Man (1908) as by David ...
Book of Eli, The
Film (2010). Alcon Entertainment presents a Silver Pictures production. Directed by Albert and Allen Hughes. Written by Gary Whitta. Cast includes Jennifer Beals, Mila Kunis, Gary Oldman, Ray Stevenson and Denzel Washington. 117 minutes. Colour. / Stylishly shot, hammily played Post-Holocaust western centred on an enigmatic loner (Washington) carrying the last King James Bible on a coast-to-coast mission obstructed by a local warlord (Oldman), who ...
Landon, Brooks
(? - ) US teacher and academic, with the University of Iowa from 1978, full professor from 1990; much of his work has focused on science fiction. His primary focus is on Genre SF in various essays and in Science Fiction After 1900: From the Steam Man to the Stars (1997), which provides useful narrative synopses of several significant titles, including William Gibson's ...
Eschatology
Eschatology is the class of theological doctrine pertaining to death and the subsequent fate of the soul, and to the ultimate fate of the world. Stories of the Far Future, the End of the World and the End of Time can be categorized as eschatological, but are considered separately; this section deals mainly with the idea of personal survival after death. / The survival of the individual ...
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, and Who's Hugh?: An SF Reader's Guide to Pseudonyms (1987) is similarly exhaustive in its listing of Pseudonyms. ...