Nyctalope

The Nyctalope, also known as Léon "Leo" Saint-Clair, is a pulp fiction hero and explorer created in 1911 by French writer Jean de La Hire.

Along with being an athletic man with great wealth and strong scientific knowledge, the Saint-Clair has perfect night vision and enhanced eyesight due to a gunshot wound affecting his optic nerves in a unique way.

In 1908, author La Hire wrote the story L'Homme Qui Peut Vivre dans l'Eau (in English, "The Man Who Could Live Underwater").

In 1911, La Hire presented a sequel to this story in Le Mystère des XV ("The Mystery of the Fifteen," later re-published in English as The Nyctalope on Mars).

[3] Like many American pulp heroes, the Nyctalope often is assisted by friends and allies, including a group he forms called the Committee of Information and Defense Against Evil.

Dismissing his own canon later, author La Hire used the Nyctalope's origin story (published in 1933) to establish that his father is an engineer and chemist named Pierre Saint-Clair.

Jean de La Hire (the pen name of Adolphe d'Espi) began his science fiction adventure series in 1908 with the novel L'Homme Qui Peut Vivre dans l'Eau (in English, "The Man Who Could Live Underwater").

[2] In this story, there is a supporting character named Jean de Sainte Clair who is the assistant to Charles Severac, the inventor and captain of a great submarine known as the Torpedo.

[2] In this book, La Hire introduces Leo Saint-Clair, a wealthy adventurer with enhanced vitality and night-vision known to colleagues by the nickname of the "Nyctalope."

The story features Nyctalope using technology developed by Professor Cavor, a fictional scientist who first appears in the 1870 Wells novel From the Earth to the Moon.

During this initial adventure, a gunshot wound miraculously causes Leo to gain perfect night-vision (the side effect being that his eyes sometimes shine with a yellow tint).

In 1940, La Hire also published an anti-French and pro-Nazi volume, Le Crime des évacuations; Les Horreurs que nous avons vues, in which he praised the Nazis for their helpfulness to the French war refugees.

After World War II ended, La Hire was convicted in 1948 of indignité nationale as a collaborator with the Vichy government and Nazi Germany.

Following L'Homme Qui Peut Vivre dans l'Eau ("The Man Who Could Live Underwater") in 1909, La Hire's official Nyctalope stories include: Léon "Leo" Saint-Clair is presented with some contradictions regarding his past.

[1] On March 3, 1912, when Léo is twenty-years-old, a mercenary called Sadi Khan collaborates with Russian terrorist Grigoryi Alexandrovich to steal Pierre's experimental Radiant Z technology which is capable of overriding and manipulating all wireless telegraphy communication.

[1] Determined to reacquire the Radiant Z schematics and technology, and wanting to avenge the attack on his father and home, young Léo recruits a group of friends to aid him.

Le Breuil offers to help, explaining that Aurora works at a nearby clinic headed by the general's brother-in-law, a surgeon and scientist named Dr. de Villiers-Pagan.

de Villiers-Pagan initially believes this is temporary, but then notes that Saint-Clair's eyes now have a yellow internal coloration similar to "a lynx at dusk" or "certain nocturnal birds."

Dr. de Villiers-Pagan hypothesizes that Saint-Clair's night vision is the result of the bullet impact producing a unique shock that transformed his optic nerves.

[1][4] After confirming he still has perfect night vision as well, Leo is satisfied he lives up to his self-appointed nickname of "Nyctalope" and declares his hunt for his enemies will now continue.

"[1] The Nyctalope and his allies track down the enemies, but in the process it is revealed that Aurora is actually Katyushka "Katia" Garcheva, a Russian agent working under the direction of her lover and mentor Grigoryi Alexandrovich.

Unsure he can attain victory alone, the Nyctalope assembles a group of allies and agents to help against Lucifer, calling it the Committee of Information and Defense Against Evil.

[1] Léo Saint-Claire AKA the Nyctalope receives mentions in volumes 2 and 3 of the graphic novel seriesThe League of Extraordinary Gentlemen written by Alan Moore and drawn by Kevin O'Neill.

A version of the Nyctalope appears in the French comic book series Le Brigade Chimerique (first published in Europe from 2009–2010),[6] created by writer Serge Lehman with Fabrice Colin, and with artwork by Gess.