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The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana
This enormous volume is the first comprehensive encyclopedia of fantastic literature of the nineteenth century. From detective fiction to historical novels, from well-known authors like Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, to Russian newspaper serials and Chinese martial arts novels, THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FANTASTIC VICTORIANA is a truly exhaustive look at every aspect of fantastic literature in the days of Queen Victoria. Readers of science fiction and fantasy will be surprised to find here the roots of genres thought to be strictly contemporary, and students of literature will be amazed at the breadth and scope of writings produced in the Victoriana era. This is an invaluable reference, and truly one-of-a-kind.
Kindle Edition
First published December 25, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
December 27, 2014
This book is big. Really big. Vastly and hugely big. You may think it's a long way down to the chemists, but that's peanuts compared to The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana. I've looked up so many entries and each time I do, I find myself wandering about to other random entries. Cracking into this book requires time (and a wheelbarrow), but it's time well spent. Rather like wandering through an information maze and finding little prizes at the end of the dead-stops throughout. Jess knows his stuff, and now thanks to his encyclopedia, so do I.
January 26, 2012
Jess Nevins’ mammoth survey of Victorian popular fiction is a hugely entertaining and handy tome for anyone with more than a passing interest in the era and its bewildering array of literary heroes and villains. As the title suggests this is in fact a straightforward encyclopedia, featuring listings and write-ups summarizing background, explaining character traits, etc…for hundreds of characters, ranging from the obvious to the obscure. Perhaps a bit less objective than I’d like, with Nevins’ injecting a strongly personal bias to some listings, it still proves to be highly useful and vastly entertaining. Sherlock Holmes is, of course, given a fair bit of coverage, roughly three plus pages, with further separate entries for other Arthur Conan Doyle characters including Irene Adler, Edward Bellingham, Jack Brocket, Micah Clarke, Brigadier Gerard, Sir Nigel Loring, Professor Moriarty, Professor Van Baumgarten and Duncan Warner. Well worth the expense and perfect for either extended reading or to dip into here and there as time and interest require. Highly recommended to Sherlockians and students of the Victorian pop literature scene alike!
July 17, 2011
Though no encyclopedia can claim to be truly exhaustive, this fantastic work by Jess Nevins is incredible in its breadth as well as in terms of incisiveness. Despite Nevins'somewhat apologetic note regarding being subjective, it is my opinion that that is the only way by which the Victorian literature can be made vivid enough to oversome the fog and gaslight. This work is magnificient in all aspects. Enjoy it.
June 28, 2009
Holy CRAP this book is amazing. Way too much text to really process in a chunk; as a reference book to those interested in Victorian culture, pulp fiction, or any kind of popular literature, it absolutely can't be beat. It absolutely boggles my mind to see the level of scholarship that goes in to a book like this. Introduction by Michael Moorcock gets it extra points.
December 18, 2008
A thick, beautiful, well-researched comprehensive look at British and European sci-fi, pulp and fantasy in the Victorian era. If you're the least bit interested in any of those, pick it up.
July 3, 2021
Awesome, comprehensive encyclopedia of Victorian era literature and also the literature that inspired it. Make no mistake though, this is a huge book that will take at least a month to read and I'll be damned if I understand how a relatively young man like Jess Nevins managed to read through that many books and produce this monster book by the age of 39! This is a magnum opus, life's work kind of book and would've been impressive even if it was the only book he ever wrote.
August 2, 2025
Absolutely marvelous review of Victorian heroes and villains. The biggies are here, like Count of Monte Cristo and Dracula, as well as many more obscure characters. Nevins' research is available online these days (go check the author's website). I've long wanted an actual physical copy for my library. A very lucky bookstore find which is now causing me to rearrange some shelves to fit this enormous book into a worthy spot.
December 30, 2021
an essential companion and reference when digging through 19c sf/f pulp/genre stuff. if you wanted to take the "every story ever" approach, this is one of the texts to consult. get the second edition
May 18, 2016
Reading encyclopediae is not normally my bag, but Jess Nevins' masterpiece of genre research begged to be made an exception. Nevins, a research librarian, started out on the web publishing annotations for Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series, and they were so good, that Moore himself noticed them and wrote forewards for them when they were published. By this time, however, Nevins had also begun casting his net more widely, compiling information on fantastical literature of the Victorian era more generally. Originally housed on a rather primitive website, Nevins eventually edited his tremendous feat of research into a book - The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana, a massive tome replete with information not to be found anywhere else except in the primary sources the book references. It's a truly magnificent work, though due to a limited print run and high demand on the secondary market, unobtainable at any reasonable price in hardcopy - I had to read it in Kindle format.
And read it I did; for what is ostensibly a reference work, it is immensely readable. The way in which it achieves that feat, however, also contributes to one of the book's great strengths. The encyclopedia could not possibly have been such a smooth read if it were strictly a collection of characters, or books, or tropes, or any one thing at all, but it is, in fact, a melange - a pleasant melange, but a melange all the same. Sometimes Nevins makes an entry of a character, sometimes a theme or trope, sometimes something else. Sometimes he summarizes the story in which a character appears, sometimes he spends the majority of an entry discussing the subject's role in literary history, and so on. In other words, the entries are varied in nature and substance, and so reading the encyclopedia is not just an endless litany of one similar thing after another. It is, in short, a reference book that can be profitably read from one cover to another (although, given its length, it does take a while).
That, however, is the reason that, as a reference book, it is also a bit dodgy. For instance, in several cases, important and influential works are indexed by a character that appears in them - and not even necessarily by the main character! Despite the fact that the entries are in alphabetical order, there's just no predicting where you should look for a given character, location, or work, a fact that wouldn't be quite so vexing if the book had an index, which, sadly, it does not. Frankly, it's a bit of luck that I was forced to buy it in Kindle format, as I can, at least, search the document for keywords. I would hate to imagine trying to actually use the hardcopy version of it as an actual reference book.
There are other problems with the book. For instance, Nevins ranges well beyond fantastical literature of the period, sweeping in genre works of all kinds, including Westerns and detective fiction, but because of his expanded focus, Nevins' choices are necessarily eclectic. However, this concession allows Nevins to situate his observations about the literature of the period (even the cheap, disposable literature) in the larger context of seminal works. Again, this makes the book more readable at the expense of its usefulness as a reference.
In the end, I have no idea precisely how to evaluate this book. It is not exactly a reference work; rather, to the extent that it is one, it's a poor one. But to the extent that it isn't, it's an excellent... whatever it is. Despite its resemblance to an encyclopedia, the work is sui generis. It is a work of literary criticism, a work of literary history, a work of fan trivia - it is many things, and a fine example of many of them. What it is not an excellent example of is, strangely, an encyclopedia. It's not a terrible one, mind you, but to approach it solely as a reference work is to miss its many strengths.
And read it I did; for what is ostensibly a reference work, it is immensely readable. The way in which it achieves that feat, however, also contributes to one of the book's great strengths. The encyclopedia could not possibly have been such a smooth read if it were strictly a collection of characters, or books, or tropes, or any one thing at all, but it is, in fact, a melange - a pleasant melange, but a melange all the same. Sometimes Nevins makes an entry of a character, sometimes a theme or trope, sometimes something else. Sometimes he summarizes the story in which a character appears, sometimes he spends the majority of an entry discussing the subject's role in literary history, and so on. In other words, the entries are varied in nature and substance, and so reading the encyclopedia is not just an endless litany of one similar thing after another. It is, in short, a reference book that can be profitably read from one cover to another (although, given its length, it does take a while).
That, however, is the reason that, as a reference book, it is also a bit dodgy. For instance, in several cases, important and influential works are indexed by a character that appears in them - and not even necessarily by the main character! Despite the fact that the entries are in alphabetical order, there's just no predicting where you should look for a given character, location, or work, a fact that wouldn't be quite so vexing if the book had an index, which, sadly, it does not. Frankly, it's a bit of luck that I was forced to buy it in Kindle format, as I can, at least, search the document for keywords. I would hate to imagine trying to actually use the hardcopy version of it as an actual reference book.
There are other problems with the book. For instance, Nevins ranges well beyond fantastical literature of the period, sweeping in genre works of all kinds, including Westerns and detective fiction, but because of his expanded focus, Nevins' choices are necessarily eclectic. However, this concession allows Nevins to situate his observations about the literature of the period (even the cheap, disposable literature) in the larger context of seminal works. Again, this makes the book more readable at the expense of its usefulness as a reference.
In the end, I have no idea precisely how to evaluate this book. It is not exactly a reference work; rather, to the extent that it is one, it's a poor one. But to the extent that it isn't, it's an excellent... whatever it is. Despite its resemblance to an encyclopedia, the work is sui generis. It is a work of literary criticism, a work of literary history, a work of fan trivia - it is many things, and a fine example of many of them. What it is not an excellent example of is, strangely, an encyclopedia. It's not a terrible one, mind you, but to approach it solely as a reference work is to miss its many strengths.
October 27, 2015
This is an incredible resource on 19th century pulp fiction (gothic, horror, historical romance, et al). I can scarcely imagine the amount of time and energy that went into this work, and it is a very complete reference.
The author makes numerous judgement calls and critical reviews throughout the book (many of which are quite funny), but expressing his opinion so openly may irk some readers.
This book is pretty scarce on the used market (and expensive), but it's well worth it if you're a fan of authors like Doyle, Machen, Scott, Ainsworth, et al and want to find other similar ideas for reading.
The author makes numerous judgement calls and critical reviews throughout the book (many of which are quite funny), but expressing his opinion so openly may irk some readers.
This book is pretty scarce on the used market (and expensive), but it's well worth it if you're a fan of authors like Doyle, Machen, Scott, Ainsworth, et al and want to find other similar ideas for reading.
March 9, 2008
Really effin' love this book. Great info on a lot of great characters. Complaints would be the amount of space given to some characters over others and an index without page numbers. Its statedly written in a personal opinion matter which is actually preferable and engaging for my kind of reading - it reads more like a conversation with or lecture by Nevins as opposed to a collection of dry summaries.
August 14, 2007
The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana is a marvel: a comprehensive reference guide to authors, characters, and works of the fantastic in Victorian times, stuffed to bursting with tidbits and nuggets of information about those folks who laid much of the groundwork for today’s literature of the fantastic. 1200 pages, people! And did I mention it’s pretty? So very, very pretty.
November 24, 2007
Probably the most amazing collection of Victorian "pulp" fiction references available. A good reference book for anyone interested in this time period (or trying to decipher references to this time period).
September 7, 2009
Hard to find now, I was lucky to be able to get a copy when it first came out. This is THE reference work to have on the subject of Victorian Authors, their books and their characters in the realm of fantastic fiction.
January 18, 2016
Ah, Jess. How I do crush on thee!
The perfect reference source for a dorky Victorianist.
Thanks to Robert for sending this my way.
The perfect reference source for a dorky Victorianist.
Thanks to Robert for sending this my way.
August 1, 2008
Completely awesome. This book will steal months of your life.
April 27, 2011
I really like this book and all of stories it references that I had never read or even heard of.
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November 23, 2017the best dictionary
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews