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Analysis Of 'The Leather Stocking Tales'

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“Every trace of their footsteps was lost in the obscurity of the woods,” wrote James Fenimore Cooper as he described the characters in his “The Leather Stocking Tales” as they were concealed by the woods. Cooper’s words have different levels of complexity throughout his novel series, which create a comparison between the colonial frontier and its inhabitants. The protagonist of these tales and the movie based on them is called Hawkeye, a white man raised by the last member of the Mohican tribe, Chingachgook. Hawkeye is known for his gun aim, and throughout the tales, earns the love of Cora, the daughter of British officer Colonel Munro. Taking place during the 1750’s on America’s colonial frontier, the expectations of two opposing …show more content…

Another significant piece of “The Leather Stocking Tales” is the blending cultures displayed that illustrate the frontier. In the movie, “The Last of the Mohicans”, one of the beginning scenes shows a cabin, and similarly to the one discussed earlier, represents peace and the blending of society. Although it symbolizes the same ideas, the course in which it does so is contrasting. In this scene, the cabin is full of life. Women, children, Mohican natives, and white men are all around a table in the small building. Within the cabin, the different groups of people speak their own languages, yet are able to get along well together regardless. This is crucial to showing the colonial frontier as compounding, proving that different societal groups can mix. Furthermore, as the cabin is surrounded by nature, it proves that nature can be used as a resource to society and that both nature and society can coexist. This is only true for as long as neither one is destructive toward the other, and since such simplicity and harmony is impossible, one must eventually dismantle the other. Similarly to how the scenery symbolizes the colonial frontier, the characterization plays a similar role. The protagonist in the series, Hawkeye, represents the frontier both as society and nature. Throughout the series, his name changes. Originally

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