SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Wednesday 25 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 23 June 2025
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Jakes, John
(1932-2023) US author initially best known for sf and fantasy, under his own name and various pseudonyms including Alan Henry, Jacob Johns, Alan Payne, Jay Scotland and Alan Wilder, before launching his Bicentennial series of novels, which traces the fictional history of a US family over the past 200 years. It achieved extraordinary bestsellerdom, undoubtedly justifying, at least financially, his decision to retire from the genre. Most of his shorter work, beginning with "The Dreaming ...
Dodd, Anna Bowman
(1858-1929) US journalist and author whose anti-socialist sf novel, The Republic of the Future, or Socialism a Reality (1887 chap), set in New York in 2050 CE, offers a scathing and comical portrait of egalitarianism brought to the uttermost, resulting in a technologically advanced antlike Dystopia. The tale actively deprecates Feminism. [JC]
Plato
(circa 429-347 BCE) Greek philosopher, included here partly because his dialogues Timaeus and its appendix Critias (circa 350 BCE) have been taken as examples of Proto SF in their vivid description of Atlantis, a fortified circular Island City on a plateau, embedding in a sketchy (but useful) narrative glimpses of a communal society. The sinking ...
Salwi, Dilip M
(1952-2004) Indian author, almost exclusively of work for Young Adult and younger readers. He wrote much nonfiction, including Our Scientists (1986), containing biographies of Indian scientists, and Nonsense in Indian Science (1998). His sf was clearly directed, though with pleasing tact, towards educational purposes, with Alien characters introduced in considerable part in order to comment on the state of ...
Thirty Foot Bride of Candy Rock, The
Film (1959). Columbia Pictures. Produced by Lewis J Rachmill. Directed by Sidney Miller. Written by Rowland Barber, Arthur Ross and Lawrence L Goldman from an original story by Jack Rabin and Irving Block. Special effects by Rabin, Block, and Louis DeWitt. Cast includes Lou Costello, Gale Gordon and Dorothy Provine. 75 minutes. Black and white. / Arnie Pinsetter (Costello) is a scrap dealer and amateur Scientist in love with Emmy Lou Raven (Provine). ...
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 ...