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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.
Site updated on 14 July 2026
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Whitham, John W
(1868-1952) US author of Interworld (1932), a tale set in a not clearly delineated Near Future where Homo sapiens remain backward on the home planet, but other civilizations flourish on Mars, which boasts high Technology and universal peace, and elsewhere. [JC]
Hichens, Robert
(1864-1950) UK journalist and author, active from about 1886 for more than half a century, gaining an earned reputation as a music critic, but now almost forgotten except for The Green Carnation (1894) – which dangerously exploits Oscar Wilde and 1890s Decadence in general – and The Garden of Allah (1904); though neither tale is literally fantastic, they are both written in a style so heated, ...
Levin, Ira
(1929-2007) US playwright and author whose first book, A Kiss Before Dying (1953), is an extremely impressive chiller. He is best known for the horror tale Rosemary's Baby (1967), in which the Devil impregnates a young woman; the book was filmed by Roman Polanski as Rosemary's Baby (1968); the sequel, Son of Rosemary (1997), is weak. Levin moved into sf proper with This Perfect Day (1970), a ...
Jones, Claude P
(1870-1945) US physician and author of a Near Future adventure, Banduk Jaldi Banduk! (Quick My Rifle!) (1907; vt The Countersign: A Story of Tibet 1909) with A L Sykes, whose American-born heroine, believing herself to be a reincarnation of Kubla Khan, frees Tibet from China with the help of an amorous American who arrives by Balloon. [JC]
Sheena, Queen of the Jungle
1. US Comic strip created by Will Eisner, S M "Jerry" Iger (using the pseudonym W Morgan Thomas) and possibly Mort Meskin, who was the artist for the early issues. Though American in origin, the strip actually debuted in the UK magazine Wags #46 (January 1938); stateside, Sheena first appeared in Jumbo Comics #1 (September 1938) and continued in every issue including its last, #167 in March 1953. The comic book series ...
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 ...