The Good and the Bad Indians in the Fiction of Cooper | A Critical Study

This book deals with an analysis of James Fennimore Cooper’s portrayal of good and bad Indians in the three novels of Cooper - The Deerslayer, The Last of the Mohicans and The Pioneers. In the Leather Stocking Tales, Cooper demarcates his Indians into two groups-the Algonquins or the “good’ Indians and the Iroquois or the “bad” Indians. Cooper has often been alleged that his portrayal of Indians has been unrealistic; and that he presented a false and ideal view of Indian character. But, a thorough reading of Cooper’s novels indicates that the claim of excessive idealization of the Indian as advanced by critics reveals a limited point of view. An avid reader would certainly admit taken all in all, Cooper has given the world, a remarkably complete and faithful picture of the character and life of the aborigines of primitive America.