The Last of the Mohicans

james fenimore cooper james a. sappenfield e. n. feltskog james franklin beard

Celebrated for almost 150 years as the prototype of the American adventure story, The Last of the Mohicans remains a perennial favorite, an astonishingly complex work to be read on many levels. Irradiated by an elusive irony that gives epic scope to the American colonial experience, it projects on a broad canvas the futile efforts of European armies to wrest a glorious wilderness from the Indians and each other. It speaks with compassion of racial injustice and prejudice, especially of the dispossession of the Indian.

In tribute to his friend Cooper shortly before the novelist's death, George Copway, the Chippewa chief Kah-Ge-Ga-Gah-Bowh, "No living writer, nor historian, has done so much justice to the noble traits of our people. The whole American feeling takes pride in such a man, as the author of The Last of the Mohicans."

Suggested by Cooper's visit to Glens Falls and Lake George with four British travellers in 1824, this book is the second of the Leatherstocking Tales in point of composition and also in the chronology of the hero's life. In it Hawk-eye appears as a reincarnation of the Leather-stocking of The Pioneers, now a younger, hard-bitten Indian scout.

George Sand, one of Cooper's many European admirers, remarked of the "While Sir Walter Scott mourns for a nation, a power, above all an aristrocratic way of life [,w]hat Cooper sighs for and laments is a noble people exterminated; a serene natural world laid waste; he mourns all nature and all mankind..."

Genres classicsfictionhistorical fictionadventureliteraturehistoricalamericannovelsclassic literaturewar

418 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1,1826

Series

The Leatherstocking Tales

Places

upstate new york, fort william henry lake george north america, new york (state), lake george new york,

This edition

Format: 418 pages, Hardcover
Published: January 1, 1982 by State Univ of New York Pr
ISBN: 9780873953627
ASIN: 0873953622
Language: English

Characters More characters

Nathaniel Bumppo

The American hero and escort to the Munro sisters, long-time friend of Chingachgook. Also known to the Indians and the French as La Longue Carabine (Long Rifle) on account of his long rifle and shooting skills....
Chingachgook

The last chief of the Mohican tribe; escort to the traveling Munro sisters, father to Uncas. Also has the Indian name of "Great Snake".more...
Magua

A Huron chief, posing as a Mohawk, driven from his tribe for drunkenness and later whipped by the British Army (also for drunkenness), for which he blames Colonel Munro. Also known as Sly Fox. The villain of The Last of the Mochicans...
Uncas

the son of Chingachgook and the titular "Last of the Mohicans" (meaning, the last pure-blooded Mohican born). Possibly in love with Alice Munro. more...
Cora Munro

...
Alice Munro

Alice Munro

Collections of short stories of noted Canadian writer Alice Munro of life in rural Ontario include Dance of the Happy Shades (1968) and Moons of Jupiter (1982); for these and vivid novels, she won the Nobel Prize of 2013 for literature. People widely ...

About the author

james fenimore cooper

James Fenimore Cooper was a popular and prolific American writer. He is best known for his historical novel The Last of the Mohicans, one of the Leatherstocking Tales stories, and he also wrote political fiction, maritime fiction, travelogues, and essays on the American politics of the time. His daughter Susan Fenimore Cooper was also a writer.

Series:
* The Leatherstocking Tales
* The Littlepage Manuscripts
* Afloat and Ashore
* Homeward Bound