SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 20 January 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 19 January 2026
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
von Däniken, Erich
(1935-2026) Swiss author of a series of purportedly nonfiction books, beginning with Erinnerungen an die Zukunft (1968; trans Michael Heron as Chariots of the Gods? 1969), which, based on a mass of often suspect and internally inconsistent data, argues that the Earth was visited by at least one Alien spacefaring race before and at the dawn of historical time; thus, for example, the Great Pyramid of ...
Adams, Scott
(1957-2026) US author and cartoonist best known for the Dilbert strip published from 1989, which when at its best superbly (in terms of concept and accuracy of Satire rather than quality of drawing) satirized contemporary office life and corporate incompetence. As with most ambitious modern comic strips, it segues frequently into sf and fantasy tropes – such as Robot office workers, wish-fulfilling ...
Power, Craig Francis
(? - ) Canadian artist and author whose first two novels, Blood Relatives (2010) and The Hope (2016), are nonfantastic; he is of sf interest for his third, Skeet Love (2017), a loose-limbed gonzo tale set in Near Future Toronto whose protagonists, beset by bad Drugs and hints of global surveillance directed at them, go on the ...
Can
German experimental prog-rock band, active in the 1970s, who released a number of sf-themed albums. Founded in 1968 by bassist Holger Czukay (1938-2017), keyboard-player Irmin Schmidt (1937- ) who had both studied under avant-garde composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, together with guitarist Michael Karoli (1948-2001), and drummer Jaki Liebezeit (1939- ). Initially the band worked with the American vocalist and lyricist David Johnson; but he was replaced ...
British Science Fiction Award
A alternative name sometimes used in the past for the British Science Fiction Association Award (BSFA Award), particularly in publishers' jacket copy. A seemingly national award was presumably thought to carry more prestige than one chosen by members of a society. [DRL]
Nicholls, Peter
(1939-2018) Australian editor and author, primarily a critic and historian of sf through his creation and editing of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction [see below]; resident in the UK 1970-1988, in Australia from 1988; worked as an academic in English literature (1962-1968, 1971-1977), scripted television documentaries, was a Harkness Fellow in Film-making (1968-1970) in the USA, worked as a publisher's editor (1982-1983), often broadcast film and book reviews on BBC Radio from 1974 and ...