Dougherty-Cooper and Irving

                 “The Pioneers” was the first of a five volume series known as the Leatherstocking Tales by James Fenimore Cooper.  The protagonist of the novel is Natty Bumppo, an old hunter who is distrustful of civilization’s progressive encroachment on the wilderness.  Cooper describes the ideal balance between nature and man as that in which “mild laws” predominate, and “where every man feels a direct interest in the prosperity of a commonwealth  of which he knows himself to form a part.”  However, he points out that the massive increase in settler population will inevitably change man’s relationship to the land to its detriment.  In Chapter 1, Cooper provides examples of the civilization is changing the wilderness, including deforestation and its effect on climate and game for the hunter (“Many American sleighs are elegant though the use of this mode of conveyance is much lessened with the melioration of the climate consequent to the clearing of the forests”) (“The game is becoming hard to find, indeed, Judge, with your clearings and betterments, said the hunter, with a kind of compelled resignation”).  From the outset, it is clear that the character Natty portrays the naturalist through which Cooper speaks his views.  In describing the attitude of the Puritan settler toward nature, Natty states, “that dog is more to be trusted than a Christian man; for he never forgets a friend, and loves the hand that gives him bread.”

In Chapter 2, Cooper shows his disdain and contempt for those with inherited wealth and their indolent and comparatively uneducated offspring.  He introduces us to Marmaduke Temple, a Pennsylvanian Quaker and leader of the group of pioneers that settled Templeton and who supported the revolution.  He made his wealth in partnership with a British loyalist prior to the war and in the profiteering from the purchase of confiscated loyalist lands after the war’s conclusion thereby shedding much of his Quaker philosophy.  After settling in Templeton, he became great friends with Natty, and was respectful of nature and a man of honor.

In Chapter 22, Cooper again describes the effect of man’s encroachment on the wilderness, “the green wheat fields were seen in every direction, spotted with the dark and charred stumps that had, the preceding season, supported some of the proudest trees of the forest.  Ploughs were in motion, wherever those useful implements could be used, and the smokes of the sugar-camps were no longer seen issuing from the woods of maple.”  This chapter also describes the slaughter of the pigeons by the entire community of settlers (the pretext being that the pigeons would overrun their wheat fields).  Natty expressed his bitter disappointment at this “wasteful and unsportsmanlike execution,” stating “This comes of settling a country!  he said.  Here have I known the pigeon to fly for forty long years, and, till you made your clearings, there was nobody to skeart or to hurt them, I loved to see them come into the woods, for they were company to a body, hurting nothing—…”   He then states, “It is much better to kill only such as you want, without wasting your power and lead, then to be firing into God’s creatures in this wicked manner.”

           It is clear that Cooper thinks that the settlers are wasteful and disrespectful to the wilderness and disruptive of the very resources upon which their survival is dependent.  His theme is the abundance and beautiful wilderness versus the greed and self-serving settlers and the resultant deterioration of society.Washington Irving’s fairytale story of “Rip Van Winkle” is set in the beauty of the Catskill Mountains and the Hudson River.  It covers the periods of time during the English rule and the post revolutionary victory.  Its protagonist reflects different character traits.  On the one hand, he is hard working and kind.  On the other hand, he is lazy and careless.  He is at home with nature, and his fellow villagers (except his wife who resents his failure to maintain the family homestead ).  After his twenty year sleep, his old village had changed.  The surrounding countryside, the Catskills and the Hudson remained the same, but the town had grown and was now busy, and bustling.  It no longer was tranquil and drowsy as before.  Yet, Rip Van Winkle acclimated to the changes and assumed the new role as a senior citizen.

The themes of this story appear to be continuity of nature versus generational changes in civilization, survivability, man’s inherent imaginative capability (Hudson and his shipmates), and perhaps the effect of democracy on the community. Irving’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” is a ghost story in which the schoolmaster of the village, Ichabod Crane, becomes the victim of a prank perpetrated by a fellow suitor of a wealthy woman.  The setting is a small quiet town whose Dutch inhabitants are prone to believe in the supernatural, but for the most part treat each other on the basis of their own accomplishments, such as education, physical prowess and talent.  Ichabad is not much of a suitor in that he can’t support himself, dresses in hand me downs, and makes little effort toward winning the woman over.  He is likeable, has some musical talent and performs physical chores for his neighbors. Crane himself believes in ghost stories, especially the favorite of the locales – the Headless Horseman, an apparition.  In fact, he has quite the imagination often reading Cotton Mather’s “History of New England Witchcraft.”  These stories often excited his imagination and gave him a fright.  His fellow suitor, Brom Van Brunt, is a likeable fellow, is known for his physicality, and his pranks.  It is not surprising that Crane would believe Brom to be the Headless Horseman and take flight.  His disappearance thereafter, however, was a bit of a mystery.

The story details much of the beauty of the surrounding area, highlights the importance of imagination in fiction, portrays Crane as a selfish individual (he only cares about the wealth of the woman not her personally), portrays Sleepy Hollow as having no class structure such as Europe, and indicates that the settlers depend on the readily available resources of nature, not their own efforts, to sustain themselves.