[jrasicmark]

What does "nyctalope" mean? I tried to enter it into Google translate, but it didn't work.

Link to the book: Jean_Lynx_05_Guerre_Secrete

[crashryan]

Nyctolopia is a medical condition, night blindness. Sufferers have difficulty seeing under conditions of low light. However "Nyctalope" originated in a 1911 French pulp novel  by Jean de la Hire, a prolific popular fiction writer of the early 20th century. La Hire (real name Adolphe d'Espi) wrote a lot of adventure and science-fantasy novels, among them a series featuring Leo Saint-Clair, known as "The Nyctalope." Saint-Clair was a sort of cyborg, with mechanical enhancements including eyes that could see in the dark. Wikipedia says La Hire's Nyctalope series ended in the 1920s, though his son-in-law printed rewritten versions in 1950.

Here's the summary of de la Hire's career--which included writing a pro-Nazi book (1940) praising the Nazis for helping French war refugees!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_de_La_Hire

It appears the publishers of Jean Lynx ripped off the name and some of the powers of the original. I still don't understand why a guy who can see in the dark is called a "nyctalope" when nyctalopia makes people unable to see at night

[Florian R. Guillon]

I've answered on the comments section, not knowing there was a more complete answer here. My bad.

Well, the original Nyctalope character is pretty well covered here. May I add something - he's one of the prominent characters in the Chimera Brigade comic-books, including "L'homme truqu