William Hope Hodgson (1877-1918) was an English author. He produced a large body of work, consisting of essays, short fiction, and novels, spanning several overlapping genres including horror, fantastic fiction and science fiction. Early in his writing career he dedicated effort to poetry, although few of his poems were published during his lifetime. He also attracted some notice as a photographer and achieved some renown as a bodybuilder. He began a four-year apprenticeship as a cabin boy in 1891. In 1899, he opened W. H. Hodgson's School of Physical Culture offering tailored exercise regimes for personal training. He wrote articles such as Physical Culture Versus Recreative Exercises (1903). Hodgson turned his attention to fiction, publishing his first short story, The Goddess of Death (1904). In 1906 the American magazine The Monthly Story Magazine published From the Tideless Sea, the first of Hodgson's Sargasso Sea stories. His first published novel, The Boats of the "Glen Carrig," appeared in 1907. Amongst his other works are The House on the Borderland (1908), The Ghost Pirates (1909), Carnacki: The Ghost Finder (1910) and The Night Land (1912).

威廉•霍奇森（William Hope Hodgson，1877—1918）

英国作家，生于英国埃塞克斯贫困牧师家庭，13岁时逃离学校希望成为一名水手，一年后如愿成行，开始了为期四年的海上学徒工生涯，20岁时成为正式水手。他早年爱好诗歌，后受爱伦•坡、儒勒•凡尔纳等人影响走上恐怖科幻小说创作道路，并于1904年发表第一篇恐怖小说《死亡女神》（The Goddess of Death），三年后出版首部长篇小说《格伦•卡里格之船》（The Boats of the "Glen Carrig"）。一战爆发后，威廉•霍奇森志愿加入英国皇家炮兵部队服役，于1918年负伤离世，年仅40岁。

《边陲鬼屋》出版于1908年，是威廉•霍奇森生前出版的第二部长篇小说。这是一部标志着与19世纪晚期传统哥特式小说正式决裂的里程碑式的作品，霍奇森藉此创造了一种全新的带有科幻色彩的宇宙恐怖小说类型。美国作家H.P.洛夫克拉夫特将此书列在对他影响最大的作品名单中。