superman

Origin

A calque of German Übermensch; super- + man. The German word was introduced by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) in his work Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zarathustra, 1883), and rendered in English as superman by Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) in the play Man and Superman (1903) and by Thomas Common (1850-1919) in his 1909 translation of Nietzsche’s work. The “person of extraordinary powers” sense was reinforced by the DC Comics’ character Superman, who first appeared in Action Comics #1 dated June 1938.