LITR 5535: American Romanticism

Student Presentation on Reading Selections, fall 2000

Selection Presenter: Paul Campbell

9 September 2000

Selection from The Pioneers

by

James Fenimore Cooper

Location: Norton Anthology of American Literature, shorter 5th edition, pp. 442-449.

Examples of Romantic styles:

Pg. 443, first paragraphs describing the natural world surrounding Lake Otsego. The following passage describes the passage of progress (similar to Irving's view on progress) as white men settle the natural world and clear the land of old growth forest in the name of progress.

" . . . green wheat fields were seen in every direction, spotted with the dark charred stumps that had, the preceding season, supported some of the proudest trees of the forest . . . ."

 

Pg, 443, the first and second paragraphs describe the lake in dark and gloomy language of the gothic style:

" . . . the lake had lost all the characteristic beauty of a field of ice, but still a dark and gloomy covering concealed its waters . . . ."

" . . . the dark covering of the Otsego was left to the undisturbed possession of two eagles . . . ."

Pg. 443, second paragraph. Cooper presents a familiar theme of the romantic style, the Holy woods, using a pair of eagles to make his point:

" . . . seeking the protection of the forests, while the white bald heads of the tenants of the lake were turned upward, with a look of majestic contempt, as if penetrating to the very heavens, with the acuteness of their vision . . . ."

Pg. 443, second paragraph, Cooper refers to a change in the weather patterns "that was as magical as the changed produced in the scene by this expulsion of the lingering remnant of winter," using the term "magical" to describe the natural world.

Sublime images:

Pg. 444, first paragraph: " . . . the heavens are alive with pigeons . . . ." This term is used several times to describe the vision. But at the same time that the villagers are marveling at this larger than life sight, they are planning to kill the pigeons that create it.

" . . . the pigeon–roosts of the south have broken up! They are growing more thick every instant. Here is a flock that the eye cannot see the end of. There is food enough in it to keep the army of Xerxes for a month, and feathers enough to make beds for the whole country . . . ." Again, the image of these giant flocks of pigeons is larger than life. They make enough food to feed an army, but the villagers are not killing to eat, they are killing to exterminate.

Question to the Class:

"After the introduction of Leatherstocking on page 444, what is his reaction to the carnage occurring? How is this reaction romantic, or is it?"

Student Discussion:

Student - He is in tune with nature and is thus disgusted at the carnage especially because of the mob mentality.

Student – He is an individual having a very individual experience sees massacre as not keeping with nature or the natural way of things.

Presentor – I viewed him as a knight in shining armor with a strict code of ethics that were being violated. But appears to violate this code by skillfully taking a life to prove a moral point.

Professor – Like King Arthur, he is a saint with a sword, honorable but in this case at the very edges of civilization.

Student – I see him as a hero.

Professor – Like Poe or other Romantic heroes, in that he is a hero even as he stands outside society.

Student – His violence is indicated by his virtue.

Professor – Very much a John Wayne character.

Lathon Lewis – Feels this is just another way to sell nostalgia, not impressed with Coopers message.

Student – Europeans are able to experience catharsis through reading. Romantic Sentimentality.

Professor – The other figure at the pigeon shooting presents the progressive rebuttal to the romantic theme (economics vs. romanticism). "They ruin my crops." Also the power of fiction to represent different voices in a society.

Presentor – Exterminating pigeons in the name of progress.

Shelly Childers – Correlation’s exist today, young readers book, where pigeons are killed as sport, killing of pigeons and Indians as part of progress.

Student – The romantic hero but critic, a burdened figure. He runs in and out of society (traversing boundaries) with a strict code of ethics (individually defined).