Deerslayer (Barnes & Noble Classics Series)

Table of Contents

 

 

 

On all sides, wherever the eye turned, nothing met it but the mirrorlike surface of the lake, the placid view of heaven, and the dense setting of woods. So rich and fleecy were the outlines of the forest, that scarce an opening could be seen, the whole visible earth, from the rounded mountaintop to the water’s edge, presenting one unvaried hue of unbroken verdure.

(page 29)

 

“They call me Deerslayer, I’ll own; and perhaps I desarve the name, in the way of understanding the creatur’s habits, as well as for sartainty in the aim; but they can’t accuse me of killing an animal when there is no occasion for the meat or the skin. I may be a slayer, it’s true, but I’m no slaughterer.”

(page 49)

 

Deerslayer—or Hawkeye, as the youth was then first named, for in after years he bore the appellation throughout all that region—Deerslayer took the hand of the savage, whose last breath was drawn in that attitude, gazing in admiration at the countenance of a stranger, who had shown so much readiness, skill, and firmness.

(page 112)

 

“Natur’ will have its way”

(page 149)

 

In a bark canoe, they were totally without cover, and Indian discretion was entirely opposed to such a sacrifice of life as would most probably follow any attempt to assault an enemy, entrenched as effectually as the Delaware. Instead of following the ark, therefore, these three warriors inclined towards the eastern shore, keeping at a safe distance from the rifles of Chingachgook.

(page 3 3 0)

 

“Ought the young to wive with the old—the paleface with the redskin—the Christian with the heathen? It’s ag‘in reason and natur’.”

(page 464)

 

James Fenimore Cooper

 

Published by Barnes & Noble Books
122 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10011

 

 

The Deerslayer was first published in 1841.

 

Published in 2005 by Barnes & Noble Classics with new Introduction, Notes,

Biography Chronology, Comments & Questions, and For Further Reading.

 

Introduction, Notes, and For Further Reading

Copyright © 2005 by Bruce L. R. Smith.

 

Note on James Fenimore Cooper, The World of James Fenimore Cooper and

The Deerslayer, Comments & Questions, and For Further Reading

Copyright © 2005 by Barnes & Noble, Inc.

 

Portrait of James Fenimore Cooper provided courtesy of
the Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, New York.

 

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced )r transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, ,including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

 

Barnes & Noble Classics and the Barnes & Noble Classics
colophon are trademarks of Barnes & Noble, Inc.

 

The
Deerslayer

ISBN-13: 978-1-59308-211-6
ISBN-10: 1-59308-211-8

eISBN : 97-8-141-14336-0

LC Control Number 2005920752

 

Produced and published in conjunction with:

Fine Creative Media, Inc.

322 Eighth Avenue

New York, NY 10001

Michael J. Fine, President and Publisher

 

Printed in the United States of America

 

QM

3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

James Fenimore Cooper was born September 15, 1789, in Burlington, New Jersey, to William Cooper and Elizabeth Fenimore Cooper. In 1790 the family moved to the frontier country of upstate New York, where William had established a village he called Cooperstown. Although cushioned by wealth and William’s position as a judge, the Coopers found pioneer life to be rugged, and only seven of the thirteen Cooper children survived their early years. Profoundly affected by the challenges of frontier living, James would repeatedly draw on his childhood experience in The Pioneers and many of his other novels.

Cooper was educated by private tutors and at Yale, where he enrolled in 1803; he was expelled in 1805 after setting off an explosion that blew off another student’s dormitory door. As a midshipman in the U.S. Navy, he served at an isolated post on Lake Ontario and in a relatively leisurely assignment in New York City, where he met his future wife, Susan Augusta De Lancey, daughter of a wealthy family. In 1811 he resigned his commission to marry her.

According to family lore, Cooper fell into writing on a dare: One evening he threw down a novel in disgust, saying he could write a better book himself; when Susan challenged him and reminded him that he could barely stand to write a letter, Cooper wrote his first novel, Precaution, published in 1820. Encouraged by favorable reviews, Cooper wrote other books in quick succession and was soon regarded as a major voice in America’s emerging literary tradition. He eventually published thirty-two novels and was the first American to make a living as a professional novelist. Natty Bumppo, who appears in The Deerslayer and the four other Leatherstocking Tales that Cooper published between 1823 and 1841, became one of America’s favorite fictional heroes. Cooper and his family lived in Europe for seven years but returned to America in 1833. Eventually settling in Cooperstown, Cooper remained on the American literary scene as a prolific writer of political tracts, naval histories, and works of fiction. He died in Cooperstown on September 14, 1851.