“‘What would you do if you were the strongest man in the world, the strongest thing in the world, mightier than the machine?’ He made himself guess answers for that rhetorical inquiry. ‘I would run the universe single-handed. I would scorn the universe and turn it to my own ends. I would be a criminal. I would rip open banks and gut them. I would kill and destroy. I would be a secret, invisible blight. I would set out to stamp crime off the earth.’”

 

Hugo Danner is the strongest man on earth, the result of a monstrous experiment by his scientist father. Nearly invulnerable, he can run faster than a train, leap higher than trees, lift a wrecked vehicle to rescue its pinned driver, and hurl boulders like baseballs. His remarkable abilities, however, cannot gain him what he desires most—acceptance—for Hugo Danner is desperately lonely, shunned and feared for his enormous strength.

 

An enduring classic in speculative fiction and the reported inspiration for the original comic hero, Superman, Gladiator is a melancholic tale of a boy set apart because of his unique gift and his lifelong struggle to come to terms with it.

Philip Wylie (1902–71) wrote several classic works of speculative fiction, including When Worlds Collide, available in the Bison Frontiers of Imagination series. Janny Wurts is the acclaimed author of many novels, including Peril’s Gate, from the Wars of Light and Shadow series, and To Ride Hell’s Chasm. She is the coauthor, along with Raymond Feist, of the internationally best-selling Empire trilogy.

“Gladiator is a brave novel that unflinchingly portrays people at their ugliest and pettiest, all the while reflecting on the better worlds that could be were it not for humanity’s relentless failings.”—Claude Lalumière, Sci-Fi Weekly