James Fenimore Cooper\u27s Last of the Mohicans as an Adirondack Novel

Cooper’s most famous novel should be recognized for how it represents some of what is distinctive and significant about its setting in what would later be called the Adirondack Mountains. Cooper’s novel contains many of the ideas about the Adirondack region that can be seen in later works about the Adirondacks, including representations of its natural beauty as an aesthetic resource for tourism, its potential for development, its representation of Native Americans, and its celebration of the region as a place for hunting and the development of specific kinds of masculinity. Recognizing Last of the Mohicans as in part a work of regional writing can help critics to see the beginnings of a long tradition of writing about the Adirondacks, that has helped to shape its cultural significance