The Last of the Mohicans, James Fenimore Cooper
The Last of the Mohicans, James Fenimore Cooper
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The Last of the Mohicans

Author: James Fenimore Cooper

Narrator: Larry McKeever

Unabridged: 15 hr 27 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 01/31/2014


Synopsis

Cooper was one of the first writers to treat America's westward expansion as a great and ongoing epic; it was a theme of conflict-between civilization and the untouched wild, white culture and its insistent encroachments on the cultures of native America. Cooper fills his novels with legend and folklore, tall-tales, romance, and an earthy individualism. This American frontier classic chronicles the adventures of Hawkeye and his Indian friend, Chingachgook, during the French and Indian War.

Author Bio

James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) was America's first successful popular novelist. Son of the prominent federalist William Cooper, founder of the Cooperstown settlement, James was educated at Yale in preparation for a genteel life as a federalist gentleman. After his father's death in an 1809 duel, Cooper quickly squandered his inheritance, and at thirty was on the verge of bankruptcy. He decided to try his hand at writing. His first novel, Precaution, a domestic comedy set in England, lost money, but Cooper had discovered his vocation.

Cooper established his reputation after his second novel, The Spy, and in his third book, the autobiographical Pioneers, Cooper introduced the character of Natty Bumppo, a uniquely American personification of rugged individualism and the pioneer spirit. A second book featuring Bumppo, The Last of the Mohicans, quickly became the most widely read work of the day, solidifying Cooper's popularity in the United States and in Europe.

Cooper was a prolific writer, publishing thirty-two novels, twelve works of nonfiction, one play, and numerous pamphlets and articles. His most lasting contributions to American literature were his five books about Natty Bumppo. Later anthologized as The Leatherstocking Tales, they are best read in the order in which they were written: The Pioneers, The Last of the Mohicans, The Prairie, The Pathfinder, and The Deerslayer.

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