The first and most important comic book superhero, Superman looms large not only in comic books but in all of twentieth-century American popular culture. Among the few American characters instantly recognizable in virtually every corner of the globe, Super-man is truly a pop culture icon. Certainly there is no purer representative of the fantastic possibilities inherent in the comic book medium.

Superman sprang from the imagination of two Jewish teenagers growing up in Cleveland during the Great Depression. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were both lower-middle-class sons of immigrants who believed in the American dream. Avid readers of science fiction and pulp magazines, the two youths aspired to write and draw their own adventure comic strip. In 1934, after several try-outs in their school newspaper, Siegel and Shuster hit upon the idea that they suspected would be a salable comic strip. In his striking red-and-blue costume with flowing red...