The Deerslayer
HarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.Set in the 1740s, just after the start of the French and Indian wars, James Fenimore Cooper’s The Deerslayer tells the story of a young Natty Bumppo, most famously known as ‘Hawkeye’, and his Mohican ‘brother’ Chingachgook, as they attempt to rescue Chingachgook’s betrothed, Wah-ta-Wah, from the Hurons. When Bumppo’s friends Harry March and Tom Hutter are also captured, Bumppo must go on his first warpath in order to rescue them.Cooper’s final addition to his classic Leatherstocking series is one of the earliest novels to be considered truly ‘American’, due in no small part to the novel’s protagonist, who embodied the popular American ideals of individualism and liberty. The novel is a worthy prequel to the popular The Last of the Mohicans, full of adventure, suspense and romance.
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THE DEERSLAYER
James Fenimore Cooper
In 1819, millworker William Collins from Glasgow, Scotland, set up a company for printing and publishing pamphlets, sermons, hymn books and prayer books. That company was Collins and was to mark the birth of HarperCollins Publishers as we know it today. The long tradition of Collins dictionary publishing can be traced back to the first dictionary William published in 1824, Greek and English Lexicon. Indeed, from 1840 onwards, he began to produce illustrated dictionaries and even obtained a licence to print and publish the Bible.
Soon after, William published the first Collins novel, Ready Reckoner, however it was the time of the Long Depression, where harvests were poor, prices were high, potato crops had failed and violence was erupting in Europe. As a result, many factories across the country were forced to close down and William chose to retire in 1846, partly due to the hardships he was facing.
Aged 30, Williamâs son, William II took over the business. A keen humanitarian with a warm heart and a generous spirit, William II was truly âVictorianâ in his outlook. He introduced new, up-to-date steam presses and published affordable editions of Shakespeareâs works and The Pilgrimâs Progress, making them available to the masses for the first time. A new demand for educational books meant that success came with the publication of travel books, scientific books, encyclopaedias and dictionaries. This demand to be educated led to the later publication of atlases and Collins also held the monopoly on scripture writing at the time.
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The Last of the Mohicans
The first thing to note about The Last of the Mohicans is that the âMohicansâ never existed. James Fenimore Cooper fused, or rather âconfusedâ, the names of two real Native American tribes â the Mohegan and the Mahican â to arrive at a hybrid name. In addition, the names are plural nouns not requiring an âsâ. Set in the year 1757, The Last of the Mohicans is the second of five novels published between 1823 and 1841 featuring a character named Natty Bumppo. He is a frontiersman who finds himself in various adventures involving Native American Indians and European settlers at the time when the United States of America was in its embryonic stage. He had Caucasian parents but was raised by natives. As a result the author invented a character in possession of traits that he evidently thought were a perfect marriage â the courage and toughness of a tribesman and the perceived intelligence and cunning of the white Americans. Although by the standards of today, these kinds of stereotypes would be considered controversial, Cooper was writing for a primarily white readership, so his hero needed to appeal to their prejudices.
The eponymous last Mohicans are two tribesmen who assist Natty Bumppo in his exploits. They are Chingachgook and his son Uncas. Cooper seems to have erroneously believed that the Mohegan/Mahican had become extinct by his own lifetime. In fact both remained extant peoples, except that they had largely given up their hunter-gatherer lifestyles by that time. Also, the Mahican had become known as the Stockbridge Indians, having settled in the town of Stockbridge. Cooper was a city dweller, so was rather out of touch with anthropological accuracy. Besides, the title lent the story an air of romanticism and nostalgia, so Cooper may well have invented the myth to suit his literary ends.
