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Wednesday 15 January 2025
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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Lyon, E D
(1825-1891) UK soldier, Governor of Dublin District Military Prison 1854-1856; commercial photographer from 1865 in India and elsewhere; and author whose Near Future sf novel, Ireland's Dream: A Romance of the Future (1888 2vols), set in a chaotic independent Ireland; its depiction of the consequences of the end of British rule (see Politics) is savagely unfriendly to the Irish, confessing inter alia to a ...
Watt, Findlay
(? -? ) UK author of a lightly fictionalized Utopia, Allanforth Commune: The Triumph of Socialism (1913), set in a Near Future Scotland indistinguishable from the real world, except for the possibility of successful collective settlements. [JC]
Wheeler, Lorraine
(1932- ) Australian author whose fiction has been directly primarily towards younger readers; Pretend It's Christmas (1984) is a Young Adult tale about the Near Future Invasion of a peaceful enclave. [JC]
Muddock, J E Preston
(1843-1934) UK author, much travelled in early life, who published prolifically under his own name, sometimes giving his surname as Preston-Muddock (though Preston is absent from his birth records), and as by Dick Donovan; in general he restricted this pseudonym to juveniles and thrillers, including Tales of Terror (coll 1889) and The Scarlet Seal: A Tale of the Borgias (1902), the latter a witchcraft fantasy. As Muddock he published considerable nonfiction as well ...
Bennett, Margot
(1912-1980) Scottish screenwriter, journalist and author, her first novel being a crime novel, Time to Change Hats (1945); most of her subsequent work, in a subtle and atmospheric style, was in the same genre. A fantasy story, "An Old-Fashioned Poker for My Uncle's Head" (August 1946 Lilliput), was reprinted in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in May 1954. Her first sf novel, The Long Way Back (1954), has become well ...
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 ...