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Tuesday 21 March 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.
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Chesterton, Rupert
(? -? ) UK author, active for perhaps two decades from around 1907. In his only work of any sf interest – the Phantom series comprising The Phantom Battleship (1911) and The Captain of the "Phantom": The Further Adventures of Captain Vanstone of the "Phantom" Battleship (1921) – the valiant British naval officer Vanstone captains a mystery ship, with advanced Weapons, initially on behalf ...
Williams, F P
(1848-1930) US author of Hallie Marshall: A True Daughter of the South (1900), an Alternate History in which the South has won the American Civil War after its victory at Gettysburg; as witnessed by a visitor from our world, the "Southland", which retains slavery, continues to flourish in 1900. Blacks, here normally called darkies, are more than content (see Race in SF). The visitor falls in love with Hallie ...
Pellerin, Georges
Pseudonym of unidentified French author (? -? ); in his introduction to that author's only known work of sf interest – Le Monde dans 2000 Ans (1878; trans Brian Stableford as The World in 2000 Years 2011) – Stableford plausibly argues that he may have been a political economist named Gustave Dupuynode (1817-1898), who held similar opinions to those expressed in "Pellerin"'s ...
Willans, Geoffrey
Working name of Herbert Geoffrey Willans (1911-1958), UK schoolmaster, author and journalist who served in the Royal Navy during World War Two. He is best remembered for his comic squibs and sketches narrated as by the archetypal 1950s schoolboy Nigel Molesworth, memorably illustrated by Ronald Searle (1920-2011) in the vein of the artist's St Trinian's girls'-school cartoons though with less savagery and more whimsy. Molesworth made his debut in ...
Woolverton, Linda
(1952- ) US screenwriter, playwright and author, very much best known for scripting Disney films like Beauty and the Beast (1991) directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, The Lion King (1994) directed by Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, Maleficent (2014) directed by Robert Stromberg, and others. After some theatrical experience, her first novel, which is of sf interest, was the Young Adult ...
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 ...