SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Saturday 23 September 2023
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for the masthead; here for 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 18 September 2023
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
Olša, Jaroslav, Jr
(1964- ) Czech and Czechoslovak diplomat whose posts include those of Ambassador to Zimbabwe (2000-2006), South Korea (2008-2014) and the Philippines (2014-2018); Consul General in Los Angeles (2020-current); author of books on history, art and literature of Asia and Africa; also sf editor, translator and bibliographer. Olša started the major Czechoslovak fanzine Ikarie XB (1986-1989), which turned into the first Czechoslovak and Czech sf monthly magazine ...
Morphett, Tony
(1938-2018) Australian screenwriter and author who began to publish work of genre interest with "Litterbug" in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction from July 1969, and who co-wrote The Last Wave (1977), co-written and directed by Peter Weir, whose last image – of a vast wave from the deeps of the ocean about to flood Australia – has become famous. Morphett's books of sf interest in his own right ...
Clichés
Sf clichés have developed, perhaps, partly out of a need for identification of stories as genuine sf – readers know where they are with a time-space warp – but mainly out of the lazy and parsimonious recycling of ideas at every level. The most obvious are cliché gadgets (Blaster, Android, Hyperspace drive, Cyborg, ...
Chapdelaine, Perry A
Pseudonym used for sf by US author, mathematician, research psychologist and director of an author's publishing co-op, Anthony di Fabio (1925-2015). He legally adopted his stepfather's surname at age 21. His first published sf was "To Serve the Masters" for If in September 1967. His first sf novel, Swampworld West (1974), routinely explores a Colonization scenario involving problems between native ...
Newman, Robert
(1909-1998) US Radio scriptwriter and author, who began publishing work of genre interest with "I Belong to the Beast" in Horror Stories for June 1935, and who was active from around 1940 in radio; some early work appeared as by Roger Howard Norton, Robert Howard Norton and Rogers Howard Norton. His early novels – including Identity Unknown (1945) and The Enchanter (1962), the latter a thriller – were nonfantastic, and ...
Langford, David
(1953- ) UK author, critic, editor, publisher and sf fan, in the latter capacity recipient of 21 Hugo awards for fan writing – some of the best of his several hundred pieces are assembled as Let's Hear It for the Deaf Man (coll 1992 chap US; much exp vt The Silence of the Langford 1996; exp 2015 ebook) as Dave Langford, edited by Ben Yalow – plus five Best Fanzine Hugos ...