James Fenimore Cooper Society Website
This page is: http://external.oneonta.edu/cooper/bibliography/books.html |
Books about Cooper
Hugh C. MacDougall
(Corresponding Secretary, James Fenimore Cooper Society)
Updated May 2008
Return to Bibliography
Compiled by Cooper Society Corresponding Secretary and Webmaster Hugh MacDougall from books in his personal collection, this list is periodically updated. Suggestions for additions, etc., can be sent to the Cooper Society
- * Weber, Nicholas Fox, The Clarks of Cooperstown: Their Singer Sewing Machine Fortune; Their Great and influential Art Collections; Their Forty-Year Feud. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2007. Biographies of Stephen C. and Robert S. Clark.
- * Reisler, Jim, A Great Day in Cooperstown: The Improbable Birth of Baseball's Hall of Fame New York: Carroll & Graf, 2006. Events of June 1939 and biographies of all concerned.
- Jones, Louis C., and Richard S. Duncan, photographer, Cooperstown. Cooperstown: The Farmers' Museum, 2006. 192 p., illus., boards, d.w. Though billed as the "seventh edition" of Louis Jones' earlier book of the same name, this is a lavishly illustrated coffee-table type book, with color photographs by Richard S. Duncan, art reproductions, and historic old photographs.
- D'Ambrosio, Paul, ed., and Richard C. Duncan, photographer, Otsego Lake: Past and Present. Cooperstown: The Farmers' Museum, 2005. 150 p., illus., boards, d.w. Lavishly illustrated coffee-table type book with color photographs by Richard S. Duncan, and historic old photographs.
- * Seaver, Robert B. ("The Badger"), Cooperstown, Otsego and the World as see by The Badger. Cooperstown: Pilar Press, 2005. Essays about the Cooperstown area, 1973-2003, reprinted from The Freeman's Journal.
- * Nielsen, Brian and Becky, Around Cooperstown in Vintage Postcards. Arcadia Publishing, 2000, reprinted 2004. Reprints of old postcards showing Cooperstown and its vicinity.
- * Ravage, Jessie A., A Region of Romance: Otsego Lake,
N.Y. Cooperstown: Smithy-Pioneer Gallery, Inc. and Otsego 2000,
1997. Illustrated account of the influence of Cooper's novels the
development of Otsego Lake as a site for tourism, camping, and
summer homes
- * Taylor, Alan, William Cooper's Town: Power and
Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic. New
York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995 (paperback ed., Vintage Books, 1996).
Pulitzer Prize-winning story of the life and career of William Cooper,
the founding and early history of Cooperstown, and how James
Fenimore Cooper reworked that history in The Pioneers. A major and
very readable book
- Rogers, Harriet and Marjorie Tillapaugh, Main Street
Cooperstown: A Mile of Memories. Cooperstown: New York State
Historical Association, 1992. The buildings of Main Street, with old
and new photographs
- MacDougall, Hugh C., Cooper's Otsego County.
Cooperstown: New York State Historical Association, 1989. Sites in
Otsego County related to James Fenimore Cooper's life and novels;
many described in his own words
- The Smith and Telfer Photographic Collection of the New York State Historical Association. Cooperstown: New York State Historical Association, 1978. Historic photographs of Cooperstown and Cooperstonians.
- Hollis, Harold, et al., History of Cooperstown.
Cooperstown: New York State Historical Association, 1976. Year-
by-year chronicle of Cooperstown, as reported in Cooperstown's
weekly newspaper The Freeman's Journal. [Incorporates earlier
versions edited by Samuel H. Shaw in 1886, and by Walter R. Littell
in 1929]
- * Cooper, James Fenimore [grandson], Reminiscences of
Mid-Victorian Cooperstown and Sketch of William Cooper.
Cooperstown: Otsego County Historical Society, Publication No. 1,
1936 (reprinted, Cooperstown: The Smithy-Pioneer Gallery, 1986).
Local history and anecdotes
- Cooper, James Fenimore [grandson], Legends and
Traditions of a Northern County. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons,
1921. Local history and anecdotes and Cooper family lore. On-line on this website.
- * Birdsall, Rev. Ralph, The Story of Cooperstown.
Cooperstown: Arthur H. Crist, 1917 (reprinted {minus Chapter 19,
"The Railroad War"} 1920, 1925, 1948, 1954; reprinted, Cooperstown: Willis Monie, 2004 [complete original edition, with new index by Hugh MacDougall] Lively, anecdotal history with many photographs
- Hurd, D. Hamilton, History of Otsego County, New York,
1740-1878. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1878 (reprinted: Ovid, NY:
W.E. Morrison, 1978). The "standard" County History, with many
engravings of homes and
personalities
- Livermore, Rev. S.T., A Condensed History of
Cooperstown, with a Biographical Sketch of J. Fenimore Cooper.
Albany: J. Munsell, 1862. (reprinted, Higginson Book Company,
1997) A miscellany of useful information
- * Cooper, Susan Fenimore [daughter], Rural Hours. New
York: George A. Putnam, 1850 (reprinted, University of Georgia
Press, 1998); Condensed ed. 1886 (reprinted, Syracuse University
Press: 1968, paperback ed. 1996). Diary of life and nature in
Cooperstown, compiled in 1848 and 1849
- Cooper, James Fenimore, The Chronicles of Cooperstown.
Cooperstown: E. & H. Phinney, 1838. First history of the village; also
incorporated in works by Hollis and Livermore, cited above
- * Cooper, William, A Guide in the Wilderness; or, the
History of the First Settlements in The Western Counties of New
York, with Useful Instructions to Future Settlers. Dublin: Gilbert &
Hodges, 1810 (reprinted by the Cooper family, Cooperstown: 1897,
1936, 1949, 1965, 1986, ca. 2000). William Cooper's philosophy of frontier
settlement
Emphasizing Cooper's Life
- * Franklin, Wayne, James Fenimore Cooper: The Early Years. Yale University Press, 2007. The long-awaited, detailed, and very readable first volume of Prof. Franklin's detailed and scholarly biography
- Long, Robert Emmet, James Fenimore Cooper. New York:
Continuum, 1990. Comprehensive and readable survey
- Wallace, James D., Early Cooper and His Audience.
Columbia University Press, 1986. Cooper's efforts to create an
audience for American writing
- Railton, Stephen, Fenimore Cooper: A Study of his Life
and Imagination. Princeton University Press, 1978. Controversial
psychoanalytic study, focussed on Cooper's relationship with his
father
- Grossman, James, James Fenimore Cooper: A
Biographical and Critical Study. Stanford University Press, 1949
(reissued 1967). A detailed literary biography
- Clavel, Marcel, Fenimore Cooper: Sa Vie et son Oeuvre: La Jeunesse (1789-1826). Aix-en-Provence: Imprimerie Universitaire de Provence, 1938. Major study of Cooper's early life and earlier works.
- Boynton, Henry Walcott, James Fenimore Cooper. New
York: The Century Co., 1931. A warm account, stressing Cooper's
personal life and character
- Outland, Ethel P., The "Effingham" Libels on Cooper: A Documentary History of the Libel Suits of James Fenimore Cooper, Centering Around the Three Mile Point Controversy and the Novel HOME AS FOUND, 1837-1845. Madison (WI): University of Wisconsin, 1929. Pioneering study of the "libel suits"
- Phillips, Mary E., James Fenimore Cooper. New York:
John Lane, 1913. Long out of print, but valuable for its extensive
personal anecdotes, and hundreds of engravings of people and places
associated with Cooper
- Lounsbury, Thomas R., James Fenimore Cooper. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, 1883 (reprinted, New York: Chelsea House, 1981).
The first full biography of Cooper, though based on limited sources
- Cooper, Susan Fenimore [daughter]. Pages and Pictures
from the Writings of James Fenimore Cooper [excerpts, with long
biographical introductions]. New York: W.A. Townsend, 1861 (and
several reprints). Also introductions to selected volumes of the so-called Household Edition of Cooper [often expanded biographical information] Also "Small Family Memories" in Vol. I, pp. 7-72, in
James Fenimore Cooper [grandson] Correspondence of James Fenimore Cooper. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1922) [All three on this website: see Memories].
Emphasizing Cooper's Writings
- * Wegener, Signe O., James Fenimore Cooper versus the Cult of Domesticity: Progressive Themes of Femininity and Family in the Novels. Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Co., 2005. Cooper's approach to Domesticity, in the light of contemporary female novelists.
- * Newman, Russell, T., The Gentleman in the Garden: The Influential Landscape in the Works of James Fenimore Cooper. Lexington Books, 2003. Survey of the role of landscape in Cooper's novels.
- * Valtiala, Kaarle-Juhani (Nalle), James Fenimore Cooper's Landscapes in the Leather-Stocking Tales and other Forest Tales. Helsinki: Finnish Academy of Science and Letters, 1998. Cooper, landscape art, and his environmental concerns [Can be ordered through the Federation of Finnish Learned Societies Bookstore]
- * McWilliams, John, The Last of the Mohicans: Civil
Savagery and Savage Civility. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1995.
(Twayne's Masterwork Studies, No. 141) Cooper's best-known novel
seen from a variety of perspectives; an excellent introduction to
understanding Cooper
- Darnell, Donald, James Fenimore Cooper: Novelist of
Manners. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1993. Cooper and
the American social scene
- Dudensing, Beatrix, Die Symbolik von Mündlicheit und Schriftlichkeit in James Fenimore Coopers "Leatherstocking Tales" Frankfurt-am-Mein: Peter Lang, 1993. Study of the Leatherstocking Tales
- Suzuki, Taisuke, The Literary World of James Fenimore
Cooper: His Works and their Relation to His Beliefs. Tokyo: Eichosa
Co., 1992. A Japanese perspective
- Rans, Geoffrey, Cooper's Leather-Stocking Novels: A
Secular Reading. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
1991. An original and influential interpretation of Cooper's most
memorable novels
- Adams, Charles Hansford, "The Guardian of the Law":
Authority and Identity in James Fenimore Cooper. University Park:
Pennsylvania State University Press, 1990. Cooper's use of legal
drama in his novels
- Motley, Warren, The American Abraham: James Fenimore
Cooper and the Frontier Patriarch. New York: Cambridge
University Press, 1987. The frontier, seen through a variety of
Cooper's novels
- Kelly, William P., Plotting America's Past: Fenimore
Cooper and the Leatherstocking Tales. Carbondale: Southern Illinois
University Press, 1983. Cooper and American historical under
standing
- Franklin, Wayne, The New World of James Fenimore
Cooper. University of Chicago Press, 1982. The concept of border or
frontier in Cooper's life and works
- Peck, H. Daniel, A World by Itself: The Pastoral Moment in
Cooper's Fiction. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977. Cooper,
landscape, and poetic vision
- Nevius, Blake, Cooper's Landscapes: An Essay on the
Picturesque Vision. (Quantum Books) Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1976. A short study of Cooper's descriptive writing
- Överland, Orm, The Making and Meaning of an American Classic: James Fenimore Cooper's The Prairie. Oslo: Universitetforlaget, 1973. Cooper's sources for the novel
- Dekker, George, James Fenimore Cooper: The Novelist.
London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1967. An important analysis of
Cooper's novels
- House, Kay Seymour, Cooper's Americans. Ohio State
University Press, 1965. Women, Indians, Blacks, and other groups as
viewed by Cooper
- Stockton, Edwin L., The Influence of the Moravians upon the Leather-Stocking Tales. Transactions of the Moravian Historical Society, Vol. XX, Part 1. Nazareth (PA): Whitefield House, 1964. Writings of John Heckewelder as sources of Cooper's information about Indians
- Walker, Warren S., James Fenimore Cooper: An
Introduction and Interpretation. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1962.
A compact and very readable study of Cooper's writings
- * Ringe, Donald A., James Fenimore Cooper. New Haven:
College and University Press, 1962, rev. ed. 1990. (Twayne's United
States Authors Series). Succinct and readable survey of Cooper's
writings in the context of his life
- Philbrick, Thomas, James Fenimore Cooper and the
Development of American Sea Fiction. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1961. The major analysis of Cooper's role in
inventing the novel of the sea
- Schulenberger, Arvid, Cooper's Theory of Fiction: His
Prefaces and Their Relation to His Novels. Lawrence: University of
Kansas Press, 1955. Analysis of the Prefaces
- Fridén, Georg, James Fenimore Cooper and Ossian. Upsala (Sweden): The American Institute of the University of Upsala, 1949. Evidence of Ossian's influence on Cooper
- Axelrad, Allan M., History and Utopia: A Study of the World View of James Fenimore Cooper. Norwood (PA): Norwood Editions, 1978. Exploration of Cooper's political philosophy. On-line on this website.
- McWilliams, John P., Jr., Political Justice in a Republic:
James Fenimore Cooper's America. University of California Press,
1972. Cooper's political views and struggles
- Waples, Dorothy, The Whig Myth of James Fenimore
Cooper. Yale University Press, 1938. Cooper's conflicts with, and
his savaging by, the Whig-dominated American Press
- Spiller, Robert E., Fenimore Cooper: Critic of His Times.
New York: Minton, Balch, 1931 (reprinted by Russell, 1963). A
classic study of Cooper's political and social criticism
- *Walker, Jeffrey, ed., Reading Cooper, Teaching Cooper. New York: AMS Press, 2007. Especially commissioned new critical essays
- Verhoeven, W.M., ed., James Fenimore Cooper: New
Historical and Literary Contexts. Amsterdam/Atlanta: Editions
Rodopi, 1993. Recent critical essays
- * Daniel Peck, ed., New Essays on The Last of the
Mohicans. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Five new
essays on Cooper's most popular book
- Bakker, J. ed., James Fenimore Cooper Issue: Dutch
Quarterly Review of Anglo-American Letters, Vol. 20, No. 3, 1990.
Amsterdam: Editions Rodopi. Papers from a 1989 Bicentennial
Conference on Cooper at the University of Groningen in the
Netherlands
- Redekop, Ernest H., ed., James Fenimore Cooper, 1789-
1851: Bicentennial Essays: The Canadian Review of American
Studies, Vol. 20, No. 3, Winter 1989. London, ONT: University of
Western Ontario. 10 papers, seven of them from the 1989 Cooper
Conference in Oneonta
- Clark, Robert, ed., James Fenimore Cooper: New Critical
Essays. London & New York: Vision and Barnes & Noble, 1985.
Recent, often politically-oriented, criticism of Cooper
- Fields, Wayne, ed., James Fenimore Cooper: A Collection
of Critical Essays. Prentice-Hall, 1979. (Spectrum Books). Modern
critical essays, mostly on specific works
- Dekker, George, and McWilliams, John P., eds. Fenimore
Cooper: The Critical Heritage. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul,
1973. Critical articles, mostly written during Cooper's lifetime
- Walker, Warren S., ed., Leatherstocking and the Critics.
Chicago: Scott, Foresman, 1965. Criticism, old and new, of The
Leatherstocking Tales, including some imitations and parodies
- Cunningham, Mary E., ed., James Fenimore Cooper: A Re-
Appraisal. Cooperstown: New York State Historical Association,
1954. Papers from the 1951 literary conference about Cooper (now on this website under Articles: New York History)
- Cooper Conference Papers: Papers from the biennial
Conference on James Fenimore Cooper: His Country and His Art,
held since 1978 at the State University of New York College at
Oneonta, have been published by the College (11 vols issued to date; 1
more in process -- most of these papers can or will be found on this website in the Articles section)
- Cooper Panel Papers: Papers from the Cooper Panel at the
annual Conference of the American Literature Association, held in
San Diego and Baltimore, have been published by the James Fenimore
Cooper Society (7 volumes issued to date; 1 in process -- most of these papers can be found on this website in the Articles section)
- * Barker, Martin and Roger Sabin, The Lasting of the
Mohicans: History of an American Myth. Jackson: University Press
of Mississippi, 1995. How Cooper's novel has been reworked into
movies, television programs, and comic books.
- * Donati, Sara, Into the Wilderness. New York: Bantam
Books, 1998. A tale of the Adirondacks in the 1790s, with politically-
correct characters loosely based on The Pioneers.
- Block, Paul, Song of the Mohicans. New York: Bantam
Books, 1995. A sequel to The Last of the Mohicans.
- Gray, George Arthur, Leatherstocking. "Suggested by J. Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales; illustrated with scenes from the photoplay. A Pathé Serial". New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1924. A "novelization" of the 1924 film.
- Preston, George H., Hawkeye, A Sequel to The Deerslayer.
Cincinatti: Razall & Co., 1897. Natty Bumppo during the Revolution;
a serious, if not completely successful, attempt to copy Cooper's style.
- [Jackson, Frederick], The Effinghams, or Home as I Found It. New York: Samuel Coleman, 1841. Two volumes. Satire on Home as Found.
- Dyer, Alan Frank, James Fenimore Cooper: An Annotated
Bibliography of Criticism. New York: Greenwood Press, 1991. 1,993
books, articles, and other writings about Cooper
- Summerlin, Mitchell Eugene, A Dictionary of the Novels of
James Fenimore Cooper. Greenwood, FL: Penkevill Publishing Co.,
1987. Identification of all the characters in Cooper's novels
- Walker, Warren S., Plots and Characters in the Fiction of
James Fenimore Cooper. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1978.
Detailed plot summaries, with index of characters. On-line on this website.
- Spiller, Robert E., and Philip C. Blackburn, A Descriptive
Bibliography of the Writings of James Fenimore Cooper. New York:
R.R. Bowker, 1934 (reprinted New York: Burt Franklin, 1968).
Bibliography of early Cooper editions
- Winders, Gertrude Hecker, James Fenimore Cooper: Leatherstocking Boy. Indianapolis: Bobb-Merrill, 1951. Fictionalized story of Cooper's childhood
- Proudfitt, Isabel, James Fenimore Cooper. New York: Julian Messner, 1946 Juvenile biography
Return to Top of Page