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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.
Site updated on 20 April 2026
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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 ...
Dawson, Les
(1931-1993) UK stand-up and television comedian, whose self-mocking, pantomime-based, "working-class" humour made a strong impact on a very wide audience; of his several novels, A Time Before Genesis: A Novel of the Future's Past (1986), a seriously overwritten Near Future tale dousing its sf elements in Horror tropes as the protagonists discover the true masters of the universe. [JC]
Curties, Henry
(1860-1928) UK author, who sometimes wrote as Captain Henry Curties; his first sf novel, Tears of Angels (1907), features its protagonist's conveyance to Alpha Centauri on an angel, who is perhaps weeping; from the star he gains a perspective on Earth, then returns home to find himself in an Alternate-History version of the future. Out of the Shadows (1908) is a detection with occult elements; When England Slept ...
Wander over Yonder
US animated tv series (2013-2016). Disney Television Animation (see Disney on Television). Created by Craig McCracken. Directors include Dave Thomas and Eddie Trigueros. Writers include Francisco Angones, Robin Budd, Amy Higgins, Ben Joseph and Craig McCracken. Voice cast includes Jack McBrayer, Keith Ferguson, Tom Kenny, Noël Wells and April Winchell. 43 22-minute episodes (usually with two segments) and ...
Mighty Space Miners
Japanese animated OVA (1994-1995; vt Oira Uchuu no Tankoufu). Written by Ritsuko Hayasaka and Umanosuke Iida (as Forsman Ranchfield). Directed by Umanosuke Iida. Produced by Triangle Staff and KSS. Voice cast includes Kappei Yamaguchi. Two 25-minute episodes. Colour / Set in the 2060s on a mining colony carved into the captured Asteroid 4179 Toutatis – effectively a working-class ...
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 ...