Cooper's Littlepage Novels: Change and Stability in American Society

Abstract

,A LTHOUGH THE LIlrLEPAGE NOVELS are unique among Cooper's late works in the amount of comment they have evoked, criticism of the tales has been fragmentary and inconclusive. Following Parrington's discussion, many critics stress their importance as a reflection of Cooper's alienation from his society and opposition to the Anti-Rent struggle, while those who have evaluated the tales as literature have usually praised most highly the ones in which Cooper's social purpose is least apparent. Each of the tales-The Redskins included-has had its defenders, and both Satanstoe and The Chainbearer have been praised, at one time or another, as the supreme achievement of the series. A more serious limitation of the general criticism, however, is that no one has attempted to analyze the series as a whole. Yvor Winters comes closest, perhaps, in that he recognizes an underlying theme-the social function of an aristocracy-animating all three books, but he does not develop the concept at any length, nor does he examine the structure of the three tales in relation to that thesis. Even James Grossman's analysis, by far the fullest and best to date, includes little discussion of overall organization and theme.'