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Saturday 27 July 2024
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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Arthur C Clarke Award
This award has been given since 1987 for the best sf novel whose UK first edition was published during the previous calendar year, and consists of an inscribed bookend and a sum of money from a grant initially donated by Arthur C Clarke. In 2001 the prize money – until then a constant £1000 – was increased to £2001 as a gesture to 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968); it has since risen by ...
Wright, Alexis
(1950- ) Australian author, a member of the indigenous Waanyi nation whose homeland stretches along the Gulf of Carpentaria in northern Australia; she has been associated for many years with various campaigns advocating the rights of Aboriginals. Her first two novels, Plains of Promise (1997) and Carpentaria (2006), both acutely but compassionately polemical, address her people and the life that has been imposed upon them. Though technically ...
West, Roland
Pseudonym of US film director and playwright Roland Van Zimmer (1885-1952), who is best remembered for the unsubstantiated allegation that he murdered his business partner and lover Thelma Todd (1906-1935). He is of some sf interest for a play, The Unknown Purple (performed 1918; 1919), which is also credited to Carlyle Moore (1875-1924), who was not involved in the film version, The Unknown Purple (1923) directed by West. The play involves the use of the power of ...
Splice
Film (2010). Gaumont presents a Copperheart Entertainment/Dark Castle Entertainment production in association with Senator Entertainment Co. Directed by Vincenzo Natali. Written by Natali and Antoinette Terry Bryant and Doug Taylor; story by Natali and Bryant. Cast includes Adrien Brody, Delphine Chanéac, Brandon McGibbon and Sarah Polley. 104 minutes. Colour. / A long-gestated homage – including an anonymous contribution by Jonathan ...
Allen, Arthur Bruce
(1903-1975) UK author whose The Pyromaniac (1938) uninterestingly features the use of a heat-operated Ray Gun. [JC]
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 ...