SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Friday 13 June 2025
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 9 June 2025
Sponsor of the day: Conversation 2023
Longyear, Barry B
(1942-2025) US author and editor who ran a printing company with his wife before beginning to write in 1977, beginning to publish work of genre interest with "The Tryouts" in Asimov's for November/December 1978. Before his 1981 hospitalization for alcoholism and addiction to prescription drugs – an experience which formed the basis of his non-sf novel Saint Mary Blue (1988) – he had already published prolifically, sometimes as by Frederick ...
Millennium
Film (1989). First Millennium Partnership/Gladden Entertainment. Directed by Michael Anderson. Written by John Varley, based on his "Air Raid" (Spring 1977 Asimov's) as by Herb Boehm. Cast includes Kris Kristofferson, Cheryl Ladd and Daniel J Travanti. 105 minutes. Colour. / Commando teams making Time-Travel raids from the future steal people from doomed ...
Woman Eater, The
Film (1958; vt Womaneater 1959). Fortress Film Productions, Ltd/Eros Films (UK), Columbia Pictures (US). Produced by Guido Coen. Directed by Charles Saunders. Written by Brandon Fleming from his original story. Cast includes George Coulouris, Vera Day, Joyce Gregg and Jimmy Vaughn. 70 minutes. Black and white. / The sadistic, misogynist Mad Scientist Dr James Moran (Coulouris) returns from the Amazon with a tentacled carnivorous tree to ...
Hargreaves, Gerald
(1881-1972) UK politician, judge, composer, playwright and author, in active service during World War One. He is of some sf interest for his only published play, Atalanta: A Story of Atlantis: A Fantasy with Music (1948) as by His Honour Judge Sir Gerald Hargreaves (see Atlantis), a musical drama based, according to his introduction, on Plato's Critias (circa 350 BCE) ...
Wattenberg, Ben J
Working name of US neo-conservative political commentator and author Joseph Ben Zion Wattenberg (1933-2015), whose Against All Enemies: A Novel of the White House (1977) with Ervin S Duggan is a Future War novel told from a moderately conservative standpoint, in which conflict is generated by a fissure between the views of the American President and Vice-President. [JC]
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 ...