SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 12 May 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 11 May 2026
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Suzuki Kōji
(1957-2026) Japanese author and essayist, largely known in English through the Cinema adaptations of several of his books, the international success of which obscured his wide-ranging domestic output. His horror and Equipoisal fiction proceeded in tandem with a wide array (not listed here) of books on young fatherhood and occasional works on motorcycle travel. He was also the translator of Simon Brett's ...
Forerunners
Term used in this encyclopedia for the frequent Space Opera plot device of a bygone Alien race which once dominated the galaxy but – following what may or may not be a significant Time Abyss – has mysteriously vanished, generally leaving behind numerous relics of its "Old Technology" which may serve as tempting McGuffins. Such artefacts often include enigmatic ...
Pollution
Early sf stories dealing with catastrophes brought about by pollution of the environment (see Ecology) tended to concentrate on the perils of smog; they include William Delisle Hay's The Doom of the Great City (1880) and Robert Barr's "The Doom of London" (November 1892 Idler). The pollutant effects of industrial waste were very familiar in the ...
XYZ
Pseudonym of the unidentified UK author (? -? ) of The Vril Staff (1891), an unauthorized Sequel by Other Hands to Edward Bulwer Lytton's The Coming Race (1871), in which vril is the Power Source for a vastly effective Weapon, whose wielder initially eliminates Indians in the ...
Hume, Fergus
(1859-1932) UK lawyer and author raised in New Zealand from the age of three until 1885, then in Australia for three years, finally back in the UK from 1888, after the detective novel The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (1886) made his name, though not his fortune, as he had sold all rights for fifty pounds before its success; along with some later books with fantastic elements, the novel is examined in Blockbuster!: Fergus Hume and the Mystery of a Hansom Cab (2015) by Lucy ...
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 ...