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Jean de la Hire (1878-1956)
Adolphe d'Espie de La Hire, better known as Jean de La Hire (1878-1956), was a prolific writer of popular adventure series and a pioneer of science fiction with La Roue Fulgurante [The Fiery Wheel] (1908)a proto-space opera. His Le Corsaire Sous-Marin [The Undersea Corsair] (1912-13), was inspired by Jules Verne; Joe Rollon (1919) developed his own take on H. G. Wells' Invisible Man. Alongside the Nyctalope, La Hire created Les Grandes Aventures d'un Boy Scout (1926) in which boy scout Franc-Hardi visits underground realms and other planets.
* Le Mystère des XV (1911, later translated into English as The Nyctalope on Mars). Crime fighter Léo Saint-Clair, alias the Nyctalope, is an indomitable Doc Savage-style action hero gifted with night vision. (Nyctalopia is a medical condition diagnosed in antiquity, in which one sees perfectly in the dark.) He also has an artificial heart, which he gained after being tortured and nearly assassinated, and which prevents him from aging. In this, the first of a series of adventures published through the mid-1940s, the Nyctalope battles Oxus (pictured at left), leader of the sinister Society of the Fifteen, who is plotting to conquer Earth from his secret base on Mars... then allies himself with Oxus and the planet's good inhabitants in order to defeat H. G. Wells' evil Martians. Then he gets married. Phew! In subsequent SF adventures, the Nyctalope will travel to the planet Rhea, where he'll end a war between the day- and night-siders; discover a lost civilization of Amazons in Tibet; and have himself cryopreserved so that, 170 years later, he can defeat an enemy who has also been frozen (hello, Demolition Man and Austin Powers). The exploits of this pioneering pulp superhero were originally serialized in French newspapers.
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* Jean de La Hire, Le Mystère des XV (1911, later translated into English as The Nyctalope on Mars). See De La Hire entry.
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* Jean de La Hire, Lucifer (1921-22). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, Le Roi de la Nuit (1923). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, L'Amazone du Mont Everest (1925). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, L'Antéchrist (1927). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, Titania (1929). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, Belzébuth (1930). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, Gorillard (1932). See De La Hire entry.
* Jean de La Hire, L'Assassinat du Nyctalope (1933). See De La Hire entry. Origin story! How he got his artificial heart.
* Jean de La Hire, Les Mystères de Lyon (1933). See De La Hire entry. Origin story! How he got his artificial heart.
* MORE POST-RADIUM-AGE NYCTALOPE STORIES, TOO
EXCERPT FROM TK:
Leo Saint-Clair alias the Nyctalope! Who in the world does not know that name and its reputation? Officially sanctioned, but free to act on his own initiative, he had organized, at his own expense, an expedition that had forced the surrender of the last dissident warlords in Southern Morocco. He had discovered and rescued the King of Spain, who had been abducted and imprisoned by a gang of terrorists.
In China, accompanied by 30 volunteers, he had captured and killed a triumvirate of brilliant but insane masterminds who had been planning to turn their vast Asiatic empire into an hellish anarchist’s haven, subject only to their bloody and barbaric whims. For these deeds, and others no less peremptory, he was famous throughout the world – but he was more famous still because he merited the strange title of
Nyctalope.
He was of medium height, slim and muscular, wiry and athletic–a complete and consummate athlete. His face and profile were Gallic, but without a moustache, like a clean-shaven Vercingetorix. His features were handsome and clean-cut and his expression virile. He had incomparable eyes, which were most often brown, but sometimes green and sometimes yellow. In poor light, the irises of these eyes dilated, for Leo Saint-Clair could see in complete darkness, not as well as in sunlight, but as well as any man might in the evening twilight on the Algerian coast in summer, when a clear sky surrounds the Moon and the swarming stars — well enough to read, without difficulty, the printed text of a newspaper. In semi-darkness, Saint-Clair could see much better, with a more precise perception of details, than in the light of noon. For this man, therefore, darkness did not exist, so long as he had is eyes open. It was largely to this nyctalopic faculty that Saint-Clair owed his success in his mad enterprises – in which it had amused him, more than once, to risk his life.
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