J ames Fenimore Cooper

(1789 - 1881)

“The common faults of American language are an ambition of effect, a want of simplicity, and a turgid abuse of terms”.

- James Fenimore Cooper

James Fenimore Cooper was the first American novelist to reflect history of his country as a succession of changes brought about by European bourgeois civilization; to show the harm that caused Indians; to show how the white men settling in the new territory.

Cooper influenced by the social ideas of the age of Enlightenment wanted to see his people live by human and democratic principals. But he found that the capitalist ways of life which have been introduced were actually more chaotic, lawless than life in the wilderness. Cooper saw only tragedy in the progress of civilization and this gave him no peace. In his opinion everything that was best in nature had been lost and society had gained nothing. The conflict between nature and civilization and the immense social changes resulting because of it are perhaps Fenimore Cooper’s main concern in his novels.

Fenimore Cooper was a 19^th century American writer. His works belong to the trend of Romanticism in literature . He is the first well-known American novelist. Readers everywhere in the world connect his name with his book about the Indians, though he wrote other novels, some of them historical and some about travelling. He wrote very many books, over thirty.

Fenimre Cooper was brought up on the family estate, Cooperstown, New Jersey. When he was only thirteen years old, he entered Yale University. In his third year he failed in his examinations and had to leave the university. At the age of seventeen he went to sea and spent six years as a sailor and later on as officer. He loved the sea and was ready to spend all his life at sea. When he married, he left the ship.

For some years he lived on his estate and there he started writing novels. His first novel was about an English family living in England. It was not a great novel, but it was good enough to be published.

Fenimore Cooper’s second novel “The Spy” was a historical novel about the days of the American War of Independence. Its hero is a common soldier who loved America. The book was successful.

In 1826 Fenimore Cooper went to Europe. He wanted to give his children a good European education and he placed them in foreign school. Together with his wife he travelled much and visited many countries. He wrote many books about his travels. When Fenimore Cooper returned to the United States he began writing his famous “Leather – Stocking novels”: “The Pioneers” (1823), “The Last of Mohicans” (1826), The Prairie (1827) , “The Pathfinder”(1840) and some others. These are his best works; they are all about American Indians.

The main character in all these novels is Leather Stocking, as he was called by the Indians. He was a white man, a hunter, named Natty Bumppo. He was kind and thought he was an ordinary man with very little education, he knew much about forest life. He also said that all men, white, black, yellow or red were brothers. He was against civilization because he thought it spoilt nature and people. He himself preferred to live in the woods far from cities. The Indians with whom he was very friendly, were closer to him than the white civilized Americans. When he became old, he joined one of the Indian tribes and died there.