As literary modernists, we struggle with the prose of James Fenimore Cooper or Sir Walter Scott. But, Cooper is like an American Homer. He defined the American hero, or perhaps more particularly anti-hero, as classically as Homer defined the ancient warriors and gods.
The Searchers is, effectively, a re-telling of The Last Of The Mohicans. Ethan Edwards (John Wayne in the Searchers) is essentially Hawkeye, and Martin Pawley (Jeff Hunter) is a composite of Chingachgook and Uncas. The American frontier moves west, but it’s still the story of a social outcast trying to rescue a captive. Inspector Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood) in Dirty Harry is a loner with a big gun, risking his life to save captives. The frontier is urbanized, but it is the same story of a man with a gun, bringing freedom to captives. Every American literary hero (including Hawkeye) is simply the Deerslayer, by another name.
Cooper is worth reading, because he addresses the core of the American legend. At a time when Americans were still fighting Indians, he tells the story of a man adopted by Indians, and portrays Native Americans sympathetically. Natty Bumppo is a homely kid when first encountered in the Deerslayer, with nothing going for him but courage and a good eye. He earns the name Hawkeye, he doesn’t choose it for himself, and Cooper suggests that in America, courage and a good eye are all you really need to be not just a man, but a legend. The purpose of life, according to Cooper, is to earn your trail names. Your birth name doesn’t matter, because you didn’t earn it. Cooper implies that who you were and where you came from, is less important than the name you earn for yourself, and where you are going.
Hawkeye is the first anti-hero in American literature. At a time when most of his countrymen are institutionally religious, he is not. At a time when most Americans are living in small towns, or trying to “make something of themselves” by moving to cities, the Deerslayer can’t abide the confines of a town or village. Most of us are seduced by luxury and sexual beauty, but the Deerslayer won’t forfeit his personal freedom for a soft life or the love of a beautiful woman. (It bears mentioning that American heroes are always practically celibate. No active love interest in the Searchers, or Dirty Harry. Their beloved is always dead, and the hero doesn’t want a replacement or surrogate.)
The Deerslayer is a hero because he forsakes all those things that the rest of us want. “Freedom isn’t just another word for nothing else to lose”; freedom is the result or forsaking everything else to pursue your legend.
Cooper created the American hero, and however hard he is to read, it’s worth the effort. Reading the Leatherstocking Tales is sort of like muzzleloading. It’s not easy. It’s worthwhile. It’s not fast, it’s fun. It’s not the common taste, it’s an acquired one.
