Last of the Mohicans - the book

[Aaron]

I've read through the whole series a few times and love 'em. It certainly is a different style and some of the plot points probably stretched the limits of believability even back when they were written, but I still enjoy them. You can't beat the 1992 movie version, though!

[Froggy the Great]

I enjoyed the book when I read it at age 12, having just seen whatever serial they showed on PBS.  Weirdly, I tried to read King Solomon's Mines last year and couldn't make it through more than half.

[Plynkes]

How strange. I find Rider Haggard a million times more readable than fussy old Fenimore.

Just goes to show that we're all different.  

[MatrixGamer]

I read H Rider Haggard ("She") earlier last year. It was an okay read - kind of like a travel book for half of it - then silly an unbelievable - but still infinitely better than Cooper. I loved Dumas when I read Count of Monte Cristo as a teenager back in the 70's. I've even read a little Schiller (his history of the 30 years war) which was not bad so it is not all 19th century writers.

I'm going to order my Eastern Indians tonight. I can trot them out for 1811 skirmishes in the future. My family was out here in Indiana then and had a hand in it.

I wish Cooper were more readable. The subject matter is wonderful - it's just the words that suck.

[Elbows]

Count me in...having read the childrens versions a couple of times, I recently decided to try reading the original.  It's sitting at 5% in my Kindle...

The movie is quite fantastic (Daniel Day Lewis being one of the finest, true actors today).  Great film, mediocre book thus far.  I've read plenty of old books, but Cooper is...eh.

[Shikari Sahib]

I agree with Plynkes, the book is dull

[FramFramson]

Don Quixote is OK. I managed an abridged form of it back in the 60s and have read it in full since. It's not the period of the writer it's the ability which turns me on or off.

I must be strange... I read the complete Don Quixote when I was about 12 or 13 or so and while I haven't had the urge to re-read the thing in full anytime recently (I think I may have read it a second time in my later teens or early 20's? Can't quite recall), I loved it. Don Quixote was a seminal event in my reading.

[Hildred Castaigne]

I was just talking about Last of the Mohicans with a buddy today.
Both of us agreed it was a fantastic film and that it was really cool that the hero was a Native American.
Is Magua in the book anywhere as interesting as the character in the film?

[John Grant]

I must be odd because all the negativity about FC has intrigued me and I will be on the look out for a copy of LotM from now on, first shopping expedition will be at Vapnartak in York on Sunday.

J.

[MatrixGamer]

I was just talking about Last of the Mohicans with a buddy today.
Both of us agreed it was a fantastic film and that it was really cool that the hero was a Native American.
Is Magua in the book anywhere as interesting as the character in the film?

Magua is very prominent in the book. He's called "le Reynard Subtile" (the subtle fox) and he is EVIL but also just a slimy little shit that you want to die - which he does.

The movie is so much more sympathetic to the Indians - the book sets the stage for all the stereotypes we have about natives - right down to calling Indian a chief. Pretty much a racist skreed.

[mikedemana]

Remember, you set yourself up for disappointment when you judge people from the past (Cooper) by today's morals and standards. We are all products of our times.

That said, I did a paper in grad school comparing the movie to the book, with the theme of how we portray our heroes says something about us. Witness Day-Lewis' romantic hero, and compare it to the original Hawkeye. He had about as much use for women as a doily. Today, though, true men must have that softer side that appreciates women...or at least that is what our image of heroes says.

I enjoyed the books, but would not say their writing style is as relevant today. It is sad, in a way, how many works are slowly becoming less accessible to us. If you think about it honestly, is Shakespeare even written in the same language we use today? No. It doesn't mean we shouldn't take the effort to read and appreciate the works of the past.

I can certainly sympathize with folks who had a tough time wading through Cooper's prose. Once you get used to it, though, it isn't so bad. To true fans of the period, I say it is worth giving the whole series another try...

Mike Demana

[Plynkes]

Interesting you bring up Shakespeare in comparison to 19th Century works. For my O-Level English (a school exam for 16-year-olds) I had to study Shakespeare and Dickens. While I enjoyed them both, I found Shakespeare a hell of a lot easier to get to grips with than Dickens, despite the fact that he is much further away from us in time.

I liked A Tale of Two Cities a lot, I loved it in fact. But it was much more of a struggle for 16-year-old me to read and understand than, say Romeo and Juliet or Richard II.

[MatrixGamer]

Cooper was writing in the style of his time. I don't hold that against him. They delighted in talking around things. They required you to think to figure out what they were saying. Dickens is the master of this. What was the government office? The Office of Circumlocution? That says it all.

Shakespeare was comparatively more direct.

Movies and TV make us value much more direct story telling. When a show switches camera angles every second or two how can you not get use to REALLY fast transitions?

This is a fun thread. I really appreciate the intellectual caliber.