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Tuesday 21 April 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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Watson, Ian
(1943-2026) UK teacher and author who lectured in English in Tanzania (1965-1967) and Tokyo (1967-1970) before beginning to publish sf with "Roof Garden Under Saturn" for New Worlds in 1969; he then taught Future Studies for six years at Birmingham Polytechnic, taking there one of the first academic courses in sf in the UK; he became a full-time writer in 1976, publishing around 200 short stories since 1969 at a gradually increasing tempo and with visibly ...
Disaster in Time
Made-for-tv movie (1991; vt Grand Tour: Disaster in Time; vt Timescape). Channel Communications presents a Wild Street Pictures Production. Directed by David N Twohy; produced by John A O'Connor. Written by Twohy, based on "Vintage Season" (September 1946 Astounding) by Lawrence O'Donnell (probably C L Moore writing solo). Cast includes Emilia Crow, Jeff Daniels, George Murdock and ...
Split Second
Film (1991). Challenge. Directed by Tony Maylam, Ian Sharp. Written by Gary Scott Thompson. Cast includes Alun Armstrong, Kim Cattrall, Neil Duncan, Ian Dury, Rutger Hauer, Michael J Pollard and Pete Postlethwaite. 91 minutes. Colour. / London, 2008 CE. The Thames has risen and society is crumbling. Coffee-drinking hard man Hauer and comics-reading Scots intellectual Duncan are brawling buddy cops on the trail of a heart-eating villain who carves ...
Hatch, Mary R P
(1848-1935) US author who also published as by Mabel Percy, including some mysteries set in the White Mountains of New Hampshire; her novel of sf interest, The Missing Man (first appeared 1892 Portland Maine Transcript; 1892), is a mystery tale whose solution depends on Telepathy. [JC]
Invisible Man vs. The Human Fly, The
Japanese film (1957). Original title Tōmei Ningen to Hae Otoko. Daiei Film. Directed by Mitsuo Murayama. Written by Hajime Takaiwa. Cast includes Ichirō Izawa, Junko Kano, Yoshiro Kitahara, Shozo Nanbu, Ryuji Shinagawa and Chujo Shizuo. 96 minutes. Black and white. / Detective Wakabayashi (Kitahara) is interviewing Professor Hayakawa (Nanbu) (see Scientists) about the stabbing of a fellow passenger on a flight, ...
Clute, John
(1940- ) Canadian critic, editor and author, in the UK from 1969; married to Judith Clute from 1964, partner of Elizabeth Hand since 1996. He began to publish work of genre interest with an sf-tinged poem "Carcajou Lament" in Triquarterly for Winter 1960 [ie Autumn 1959]; he began consistently publishing sf reviews in his "New Fiction" column for the Toronto Star (1966-1967), and later in ...