Product Description
The Deerslayer, byJames Fenimore Cooper, is part of theBarnes & Noble Classicsseries, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features ofBarnes & Noble Classics:
All editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest.Barnes & Noble Classicspulls together a constellation of influencesbiographical, historical, and literaryto enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works.
Live by your own council. Be brave in the face of the unknown. Be always fair.
-Natty Bumppo,The Deerslayer
One of the greatest heroes in American literature, Natty Bumppo is the rugged frontiersman ofJames Fenimore CoopersLeatherstocking Tales, a series of five novels that includesThe Last of the MohicansandThe Deerslayer. Although the final volume to be written,The Deerslayeris the first in the chronology of Natty Bumppos life, depicting the character as a young man testing himself in the wilderness, and against enemies, for the first time.
Set in the 1740s just as the French and Indian wars have begun, the novel opens as Natty Bumppoknown as Deerslayerand his friend Hurry Harry travel to Tom Hutters house in upstate New York. Hurry plans to marry Toms beautiful daughter Judith, while Deerslayer has come to help his close friend Chingachgook save his bride-to-be, Wah-ta-Wah, from the Huron Indians. When war breaks out, and Hurry and Tom are captured by Indians, Deerslayer must go on his first warpath to rescue them.
One of the earliest novels to be considered truly American,"The Deerslayeris a masterpiece of suspense, adventure, and romance.
Bruce L. R. Smithis a fellow at the Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University. He is the author or editor of sixteen scholarly books, and he continues to lecture widely in the United States and abroad.