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Wednesday 18 February 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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Knoblock, Edward
(1874-1945) US-born playwright and author born Knoblauch; in UK from 1897, changing his name to Knoblock in 1916 when he became a British citizen; during World War One he served in the intelligence service. Most of his plays were nonfantastic, including collaborations with other authors like Arnold Bennett and J B Priestley, though his most popular drama, ...
Van Gennep, Arnold
(1873-1957) Dutch-German anthropologist, sociologist and author, in France from early manhood; he is best known for Les Rites de Passage [for subtitle see Checklist below] (1909; trans Gabrielle L Caffe and Monika B Vizedom as The Rites of Passage 1960), whose breakdown of ceremonies of transition into three phases – separation, liminality and incorporation – has influenced authors of fiction for over a century. Van Gennep is some direct sf interest for ...
Griffin, Peni R
(1961- ) US author who began publishing work of genre interest with "The Tower of Voices" for Pandora (Summer 1988 #20), but who has since concentrated almost exclusively of Timeslip fantasies for the Young Adult market (not listed below); her first novel, however, Otto from Otherwhere (1990), competently depicts the interaction between human adolescents and an ...
Long, James
(1949- ) UK author under his own name of Ties to the Battletech universe, beginning with Battletech: Main Event (1993), and at least one Technothriller of sf interest, Game Ten (1994), in which an ancient conspiracy threatens the Near Future; and of the ELV sequence of humorous ...
Weybright and Talley
US publisher, which was founded in 1966 and sold circa 1973 to David McKay Publications, who dissolved the imprint. It is remembered for discovering John Boyd and publishing his first nine novels. / Victor Weybright and Truman Talley (1925-2013) served as publisher and editor respectively, as they had done at New American Library in the 1950s and the first half of the ...
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 ...