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Wednesday 17 June 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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Yolen, Jane
(1939-2026) US author, partially resident in Scotland, who began publishing poems and articles when still in college, and who first came to notice with books for children, the first of many being Pirates in Petticoats (1963). Of her circa 460 titles, many of which won awards in her field, most were for children (see listing below for some of these), many of them being picture books for younger children; most of her adult fiction, of which she wrote relatively little, was ...
Ryder, James
Pseudonym of UK author James Pattinson (1915-2009), a merchant-navy gunner during World War Two; his more than 100 novels are mostly thrillers under his own name, many with naval settings. His sf adventures for Robert Hale Limited are Kark (1969), set in a Near Future authoritarian Dystopian state of Britain against which the protagonist rebels, and Vicious Spiral ...
Paton, John
Pseudonym of UK author Frederick John Alford Bateman (1921-2004), whose unremarkable Space Operas for Robert Hale Limited comprise Leap to the Galactic Core (1978), Proteus (1978) and The Sea of Rings (1979). [JC]
Hamilton, Bernard
(1863-1930) UK barrister and author; father of Patrick Hamilton, who created several characters in several novels who reflected his spendthrift flamboyance and alcoholism. Hamilton's one work of any sf interest is The Light?: A Romance (1898), a heavily plotted tale set mostly in Ancient Egypt and partly, via obscurely explained Reincarnations, around 1870; ...
Science Fiction Critic, The
US Fanzine (1935-1938) edited by Claire P Beck (1919-1999), 14 issues, published bimonthly; #1 only, November 1935, was titled The Science-Fiction Review; last two issues merged with Phantastique edited by William Miller Jr. Contributors included Clyde F Beck (the editor's brother), John Carnell, Hugo Gernsback, Robert A ...
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 ...