Gladiator

Name: Gladiator
Brand: Blackstone Audiobooks
Availability: InStock
Author: Philip Wylie
ISBN: 9798212329545

Author: Philip Wylie

Narrator: Joel Simler

Unabridged: 8 hr

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Spoken Realms

Published: 12/13/2022

Categories: Fiction, Science Fiction, Action & Adventure, Fantasy, Superheroes

Synopsis

Hugo Danner—a man with strength unparalleled. A man to physically rival any human, any beast, any machine, and maybe even the gods themselves. But will the world accept his existence?Hugo didn’t ask for this gift that his father, brilliant biologist Abednego Danner, bestowed upon him; a “gift” that promises a life of greatness. From being a baby that can launch himself from a second-story window unscathed, a boy that can leap canyons and hurl boulders, a football star that can beat an opposing team single-handed, a man capable of crushing an entire enemy platoon with his bare hands; surely such a person could steer the entire world to their whims.But, does the world hold any post for a man of such strength? What good is immortal muscle when your own humanity, and the world itself, want to hold you back? Are there imperturbable forces that could stop a man who is capable of moving mountains from realizing his destiny?First published in 1930, Philip Wylie’s Gladiator precedes Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster’s Superman by eight years and is part of a foundation of incredible stories featuring individuals with powers beyond human limits. Fans of superheroes will be astounded by this early rendition of very modern tales.

About Philip Wylie

Philip Gordon Wylie, born May 12, 1902 in Beverly, Massachusetts, was the son of Presbyterian minister Edmund Wylie, and novelist Edna Edwards, who died when Philip was 5 years old. While he was born in Massachusetts, his family later moved to Montclair, New Jersey. He attended Princeton University for three years but did not graduate.Philip was a prolific writer and novelist, having worked as a Hollywood script writer and as a contributor to many national publications. He had a keen and quizzical mind which he used to write dozens of novels and short stories. Much of his work spanned a variety of genres from speculative fiction and sci-fi, to mystery and satire, and often explored critiques of American society and the human condition. His speculative and science fiction works very likely influenced many other writers, which led to the creation of characters we know and love today such as Superman and Doc Savage. Philip was married twice and had one child, Karen Pryor, who is a prolific writer herself, notably having founded the clicker training method often used for dog training. On October 25th, 1971, Philip died of a heart attack while vacationing in Miami.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jim on October 22, 2014

A friend of mine reviewed this saying it was progenitor of Superman & Doc Savage. Dan's review is here: [URL not allowed] I found it for free on Gutenberg.org This is a story of angst, a coming of age story. An experiment, Hugo Danner is as strong as the Hulk & quite intelligent......more

Goodreads review by Sandy on July 31, 2022

In a recent review here on Goodreads, for J.D. Beresford's seminal 1911 classic "The Wonder," I mentioned that the novel was an early example of one of Radium Age sci-fi's favorite themes, that of the "superman" or "wunderkind." In that book, we had encountered a young British lad, Victor Stott, who......more

Goodreads review by Oleksandr on November 09, 2019

This is a SF novel that can be viewed as one of the progenitors of Superman. Originally published in 1930 it contains some ideas that later became a trope of Superhero genre. The story start with a scientist, Abednego Danner, who was a professor of biology in a small college in the town of Indian Cre......more

Goodreads review by Eugene on January 10, 2018

What a find! This book, written in 1930, is the 'mother' of the superhero genre. It's also far more than the pulp adventure it may appear, with a well-thought out and prescient plot that sees the protagonist struggling to come to terms with his superpowers. Raced through it and thoroughly enjoyed it......more

Goodreads review by Jonathan on January 07, 2018

In which all the new-fangled emotional and psychological complexity claimed for modern superhero movies is found to have been there from the start "When you were little more than a mass of plasm inside your mother, I put a medicine in her blood that I had discovered. I did it with a hypodermic needl......more