Genre - Sentimental novel, adventure novel, frontier romance

Time and place written - 1826, Europe

Publisher - Carey & Lea of Philadelphia

Point of view - Third person. The narrator follows the actions of several characters at once, especially during combat scenes. He describes characters objectively but periodically makes reference to his own writing.

Tone - Ornate, solemn, sentimental, occasionally poetic

Setting (time) - Several days from late July to mid-August 1757, during the French and Indian War

Setting (place) - The American wilderness frontier in what will become New York State

Major conflict - The English battle the French and their Indian allies; Uncas helps his English friends resist Magua and the Hurons.

Rising action - Magua captures Cora and Alice, beginning a series of adventures for the English characters, who try to rescue the women.

Climax - Uncas triumphs over Magua in the Delaware council of Tamenund in Chapter XXX.

Falling action - Magua dies; Cora and Uncas are torn apart

Symbols - Hawkeye; “the last of the Mohicans”

Magua - Magua, an Indian of the Huron tribe, plays the crafty villain to Hawkeye's rugged hero. He is nicknamed Le Renard Subtil, or The Subtle Fox. Once a chief among his people, Magua was driven from his tribe for drunkenness. Because the English Colonel Munro enforced this humiliating punishment, Magua possesses a burning desire for retaliation against Munro.He does not want to do bodily harm to Munro but wants to bruise the colonel's psyche. Magua has a keen understanding of whites' prejudices, and he knows that threatening to marry the colonel's daughter will terrify Colonel Monroe. Magua's threat to marry a white woman plays on white men's fears of interracial marriage. When Magua kidnaps Cora, the threat of physical violence or rape hangs in the air, although no one ever speaks of it. Whereas the interracial attraction between Uncas and Cora strikes us as sweet and promising for happier race relations in the future, the violent unwanted advances of Magua to Cora show an exaggerated fulfillment of white men's fears. However, while anger originally motivates Magua, affection eventually characterizes his feelings for Cora. He refuses to harm her, even when in one instance his actions put himself in danger. Magua's psychology becomes slightly more complicated by the end of the novel, when sympathy tempers his evil.

Some topics in this essay:
Major Heyward, Disguise Cooper, Hawkeye Hawkeye, European Indian, Gamut Calvinist, Uncas Hawkeye's, Annoyed Gamut's, Hawkeye Cooper, Motifs Motifs, Colonel Munro, william henry, fort william, fort william henry, colonel munro, french indian, indian tribes, cora uncas, french indian war, david gamut, alice cora, cooper suggests, indian war, hostile indian tribes, changing idea family, british forces fort,